


Gottmord

by sarensen



Series: The Sound of Broken Glass [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, And Then He Doesn't, Canon Typical Violence, Emperor Hux, Hux Hates Ren, Inappropriate Use of the Force, M/M, Manipulation, Phasma cameo, Semi-Violent Sex, Supreme Leader Kylo Ren, Swearing, a surprising amount of gore, even more swearing, hux is a human disaster, hux is a psychopath, hux is an opportunistic fuck, hux is one thousand percent extra about everything always, hux literally never shuts up in his head even during sex, inappropriate exploitation of stormtroopers, inappropriate use of blood, knights of ren cameo, kylo ren's massive dick, mitaka cameo, more swearing, paranoid hux is paranoid, power-hungry hux
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-31
Updated: 2016-05-31
Packaged: 2018-07-11 08:39:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 46,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7041142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarensen/pseuds/sarensen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>General Hux is not a religious man. The shining ideologies of the First Order have always brought him more comfort than any faith ever could, and he’s willing to cross every line to ensure the Order’s success.<br/>Supreme Leader Snoke has done an adequate job of ruling the Order so far, but when the destruction of Starkiller Base goes unpunished, Hux starts to suspect Snoke might not be fully invested in the cause. With the lack of a strong leading power, the only thing left to do is embrace his destiny and take control of the Order himself.<br/>Meanwhile, Kylo Ren all but worships at Snoke’s feet. To remove Snoke from the equation, Hux must first sway Ren to his cause. But Ren will not be persuaded so easily. Still reeling from the death of Han Solo, Ren's emotions are wildly out of balance, and Hux must walk the dangerous line between taking advantage of his vulnerability and pushing him too far.<br/>And to make things worse, his budding and frankly very inconvenient physical attraction to Ren might be starting to cloud his judgement. It would be so much easier to just shoot Ren and take care of Snoke himself, but that would be wrong. </p>
<p>Wouldn't it?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hux and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Turmoil. Absolute fucking chaos. Hux has had a fair number of bad days in his life, but The Day Starkiller Base Blew Up rates a solid ridiculous on his shit-I’ve-had-to-put-up-with scale. And that was  _ before _ he got ordered to pull Kylo Ren from the wreckage. 

He takes a shuttle and one squadron of Stormtroopers for good measure, because if Ren isn’t already dead he thinks he might just arrange for an impromptu execution by firing squad. Ren and his family drama and his frankly ridiculous obsession with finding Skywalker. He  _ blew up _ Hux’s planet. (The rational part of Hux’s mind chimes in that Ren probably wasn’t directly responsible for the explosion. Hux does the mental equivalent of squishing it under his boot. He doesn’t want to be rational. He’s pissed.)

The strong searchlight of the shuttle reveals something close to what Hux imagines hell would look like, if he believed in that kind of thing.   He’s often idly pictured the destruction wrought by Starkiller Base; imagined planets disintegrating under its fury, shaking themselves apart into a fiery end because he commanded it. But those planets had always been thousands of lightyears away. He finds it significantly less romantic now that the deteriorating planet in question is one he’s currently on. There’s a word for the enormity of seeing a planet being torn to shreds right outside the viewport of a shuttle that is most definitely not built to withstand this kind of destruction. 

Terrifying. That’s the word he’s looking for. 

The sky is dark following the death of the sun, but there's lots of light on the surface: the shuttle has to swerve to avoid debris spit up by deep fissures ripping into the earth, swallowing the forest into wide maws filled with fire. Hux grabs onto a handhold extending from the roof, bracing one foot on the unoccupied co-pilot’s seat, and scowls at what he can see below. 

“Keep us level!” he instructs the ‘trooper pilot, “And keep your eyes on the ground!” He has to raise his voice to be heard over the tremendous thundering of earthquakes and explosions from beneath them. The intermittent blip of Ren’s tracking device on the shuttle’s scanners leads them East towards the forest, but even with the help of the tracker, finding Ren in this chaos will be harder than the proverbial needle in a haystack. He scans the surface nervously, eyes following the trail of the searchlight. 

As it turns out, the search is over almost before they’ve properly left the shuttle bay; a shout of “There!” from the pilot, and Hux can just make out what he’s pointing to on the very edge of the pool of light cast by the shuttle if he squints and turns his head just  _ so _ . Ren apparently made it back to just outside the main control centre on his own steam, before crumbling into what appears to be a heap of black leather and blood. 

The shuttle closes in and hovers a few feet above ground, the thrusters blasting whirls of white snow and grey ash and debris into the air. He makes his way to the aft of the shuttle briskly, one hand braced against the wall. His squadron of Stormtroopers are strapped into the metal benches bolted to the bulkheads, five abreast, facing each other with blaster rifles resting on their knees and postures tense. He swears he can see their fear right through those ridiculous masks.

He barks at a ‘trooper to release the airlock, and reaches up to brace himself on the roof as the doors hiss open.

The roar of the shuttle’s engines is dulled by the last sputtering gasps of the planet, screaming as it shakes itself to pieces. Hux holds onto the overhang, his coat whipping in the wind, and leans over as far as he can without losing his balance. It’s cold. Freezing sleet bites into his face and the small gap between his sleeve and glove. To his right, fire and lava sputter from a chasm wider than a river, and right beneath him on the snow lies the mighty Kylo Ren.

There’s more blood than he originally thought. Ren is cradling his face in one hand, his hair draping like a curtain over his fingers, blossoms of deep red seeping into the black-and-white patchwork of snow under his head, his shoulder, his side, and lower down. His other hand clutches his lightsaber like he would rather lose his arm than ever let go of it again.

Hux catalogues his injuries as best he can from this vantage point. That much blood, he supposes Ren might actually be dead. He has to grudgingly stamp out the hope that he might be right.

He pulls himself back into the shuttle, gesturing at two Stormtroopers.

“Well, don’t just sit there,” he waves in Ren’s general direction, “Go get him.”

The two ‘troopers he’s indicated actually have the audacity to hesitate, glancing at each other nervously for a second. It’s very loud outside the shuttle. And yes, still terrifying. But Stormtroopers are not raised to disobey a direct order from General Hux, so they unbuckle their restraints and jog past Hux to jump from the shuttle’s aft port, blasters clutched to their chests. It’s a short fall.

Trees are toppling all around them, rupturing with loud cracks, the ground shaking violently enough to make it difficult for them to keep their footing. 

The roar of the ground tearing open behind him spurring him on, the first ‘trooper leans down to grab Ren’s arm with both hands and  _ pulls _ \- and suddenly Ren is up somehow, as much fluid motion as he was motionless a moment ago, shoving the ‘trooper away roughly as he staggers to his feet. His eyes are wild, face frozen into a snarl around a long gash tearing over his cheek and nose. Not dead after all, Hux thinks. Great. He guesses.

Ren’s yelling something at the Stormtooper, Hux can’t hear what. The other steps forward, maybe attempting to take his shoulder but Ren’s hand lashes out, sending him flying backwards with a blast of the Force. The ‘trooper tumbles into the widening trench - now a ravine - and disappears into the maw of fire with a high-pitched scream that does make it all the way to the shuttle. Hux wishes they would hurry. They need to get out of here. 

Ren is stumbling towards the shuttle under his own steam now, lightsaber clipped to his belt, footsteps heavy and one hand clutching at his side. His power is clearly all over the place. Snow gusts outwards in shockwaves around his feet with each limping step. When he slips, the outflung hand he braces himself with on the Force shreds a long tear into the ground, blasting mud and leaves into the air. The remaining Stormtrooper trails fearfully a few feet behind him, rifle half-raised as if that would offer any protection. Hux wouldn’t be lying if he said he’d have preferred Ren dead, but the current state of him does fill him with a certain petty satisfaction.

Hux ducks out of the way as Ren levers himself on board the shuttle in a flurry of snow and leaves, dripping blood in a trail to where he sinks down onto a bench with a groan, one hand pressed over the wound in his side, the other clenched in a fist on his thigh. He lowers his head, hair falling over his face to hide it. Hux fights the urge to tell him how pathetic he looks and hurries instead to the shuttle’s cockpit. The doors hiss shut behind him after the other ‘trooper clambers in, cutting off the wind and the cold and that terrible, terrible roar. 

He ducks under the low cockpit door, about to order the pilot to take them off-world when something below them explodes, whipping the shuttle to the side with a screech of the engines and making him lose his balance. He knocks into the wall, hard and with a very undignified “oof”, and has to scrabble for purchase as the shuttle veers dangerously left, dipping over towards to the planet’s surface and swerving wildly as the pilot tries to level out. Hux grimaces as he gropes onto the ledge of the control panel set into the wall, smashing over buttons blindly as his hands frantically scrabble for purchase. 

Another explosion and this time something bangs into the shuttle hard enough to send them spinning. A loud alarm starts blaring, red lights flashing from somewhere above them and Hux fights the urge to yell  _ yes, we know, thank you! _ at it.

“Starboard engine three is out,” the pilot reports in a strained voice, leaning to one side with the physical effort of trying to right the shuttle, “Debris from the surface, sir.”

“Can she break the gravitational field?” Hux asks, still clutching onto the control panel like a burr, “I want us in orbit two seconds ago.”

“Trying, sir,” the pilot responds, wrestling with the controls. To his credit, he sounds only a little panicked. There’s some more tilting and pitching and one horrifying moment where Hux thinks they might actually flip  _ upside down _ , but then they are somehow upright, the shuttle tilting backwards gently as it fires up towards the stars, gravity slowly returning to where it was meant to be. Hux releases a breath he didn’t know he was holding, and forces his fingers to let go of the control panel one by one. He straightens up, smoothing down the lapels of his coat as the shuttle shudders into the turbulence of the planet’s atmosphere, the light from the surface slowly fading into a dull blue, then black. Turbulence is fine. Turbulence, he can deal with.

The pilot kills the alarm as they break free of the cloud cover and suddenly they are among stars, the chaos and noise of Starkiller Base lost to the vast calm of space. Hux doesn’t really allow himself to breathe until he feels the gentle displacement of the shuttle’s artificial gravitation kicking in, all sound dwindling into a whisper, and then the blessed quiet of the cosmos. He schools his features (abject horror tends to make one frown a bit), folds his hands behind his back and squares his shoulders, hoping the familiar soldier’s stance will calm his still-racing heartbeat.

The shuttle slows to a stop just outside of the planet’s gravitational field, and inch by inch, thrusters swivel it around to face what is left of Starkiller Base. Apparently, this is how far Hux’s resolve is willing to take him. He feels his legs start to buckle and has to brace himself on the back of the pilot’s seat with one hand. Nothing. There’s nothing left of his planet.

And so here is General Hux of the First Order, exiled on a pathetic little shuttle on the edge of what’s left of his whole world, watching the last of Starkiller Base disintegrate beneath them with a kind of quiet exhaustion. Years of his life, endless sleepless nights going up in literal flames right in front of his eyes. A planet’s worth of asteroids expanding towards them in slow motion around a boiling, fiery core.  The weapon that would win the war for order, the invention that would make Hux’s name go down in history, reduced to so much space rubble. Hux feels tired to his bones.

Slowly, he becomes aware of a quiet, insistent beeping, coming from the cockpit. He tears his eyes away from the viewport to the control panel, where the pilot is bringing up a transmission. 

“From the Supreme Leader, sir,” is the quiet explanation.

Hux nods at him curtly. Of course. He supposes he should have expected the call; Snoke will be wanting to know the status of his  _ precious cargo _ . Hux pinches the bridge of his nose against the start of what is bound to be a very bad headache. The pilot presses a button and a hologram fizzles into view above the control panel,  pixelated and neon green. 

It’s… not Snoke. Hux blinks. Unless Snoke has turned into a tiny sphere, calmly rotating in the centre of the hologram, data lines blurring its edges. A set of coordinates sits shakily underneath, blinking in and out of existence at random intervals. They mean nothing to him.

“This is?” Hux prompts when the pilot is not forthcoming with more information, squinting at the tiny green orb.

“Star-forming region Sh 2-106, General. One of the planets in the Eastern quadrant.”

Hux lets his eyes slide over to the pilot, hoping he can convey at least a fraction of how willing he would be to just shoot the ‘trooper if Hux could pilot the damn shuttle himself. “And what,” he grinds out, “What exactly is on this planet in the Eastern quadrant of Star-forming region Sh 2-106, if I may?”

The pilot hesitates.”Er. Supreme Leader Snoke, apparently. Sir.”

Huh. Hux peers at the little flickering orb, going over the coordinates again. They are definitely not familiar to him. Yet the Supreme Leader did order Hux to bring Ren to him. 

And so, he supposes, life must go on. The First Order will not end with Starkiller Base. Their defeat of the Hosnian system remains unparallelled. The destruction of their weapon was a setback for sure - and on a personal level for Hux, a pretty goddamn big deal - but it was but one lost battle in the midst of a war they are busy winning. The Resistance may have taken his planet from him (and oh, how he is going to make them  _ pay _ for that), but nothing can destroy his devotion to the cause. 

He allows himself one long, lingering glance at the debris outside the viewport. Then, clasping his hands behind his back, he straightens up, folding stoicism around himself like a cloak, and becomes the General once more. 

“Very well. Take us there.”

The pilot hesitates to speak up. His hand hovers over the controls for a second, but he pulls it away, the white Stormtrooper helmet turning towards Hux. “If I may, sir. Not back to the Finalizer?”

Hux considers. There are supplies on the Finalizer, to be sure. Reinforcements. Parts to have the shuttle fixed, and the manpower to do so. There’s also a fair amount of alcohol on the star destroyer, and he’d not be lying if he said he could really use a drink right now. But the Finalizer is one of the most famous symbols of the First Order. Also currently one of the only remaining symbols of the First Order. To take it out of its current anchor right after the destruction of Starkiller Base…

“No,” he decides, “the Supreme Leader’s command was to bring Lord Ren to him. If we take the Finalizer it will look like we’re retreating. What’s important now is to keep up a front for the Resistance, so the Finalizer stays where she is anchored. We take the shuttle to Snoke, if we can make it there in one piece.”

“Starboard engine’s taken a fair amount of damage, sir, but she should pull through,” the pilot says as he turns back to the chaos of buttons and levers on the control panel to set their coordinates.  The shuttle engages hyperspeed, the stars streaking into a blur with the familiar nauseating feeling of displacement in Hux’s stomach. Snoke’s planet is lightyears away; it will take a few hours to get there.

As much as he’s loath to admit it, they need to recuperate. He can't remember the last time he slept, much less the last time he ate something. So eat, then rest. He needs it. The Stormtroopers probably need it. Kylo Ren most certainly needs it, if all of that blood in the snow belonged to him. 

Hux darkens when his thoughts turn to Ren. He has a fair amount he would like to say to him before they reach Snoke, which may or may not include several insults directed towards his lineage, his life choices so far, and possibly his fashion sense, if Hux can find it in himself to stop berating him for his management of the bomb situation on Starkiller Base long enough.

But first. 

He takes a moment to compose himself before returning to the aft of the shuttle. 

Kylo Ren is where Hux left him, bowed over himself with his face in his hands. The Stormtroopers have given him a wide berth even in the small hull of the shuttle, six somehow packed onto the opposite bench, the remaining two crowded against the walls on either side of Ren, carefully not touching the slowly spreading pool of blood seeping from his thigh.

Hux indicates one of the ‘troopers with a tilt of his chin. “You,”

The Stormtrooper scrambles to her feet with a smart salute, “Sir.”

“Contact the Finalizer immediately. I want a status report. Casualty numbers, equipment damage reports, a statement of the estimated financial loss induced by this whole fiasco. I want to know if there’s anything we can salvage. If so much as a bolt made it into that mess of space debris, I want to hear about it.”

The ‘trooper salutes again and disappears into the cockpit.

“And get me Phasma,” Hux calls after her as an afterthought. He should have heard from his Captain by now. The thought that she might not have made it off Starkiller Base doesn’t even cross his mind. Phasma’s tough. A survivor. He might not have actually ever seen her lift an entire Tie-fighter by herself as rumour on the Finalizer had it, but he has no doubt that she could do it. He’ll never admit it to anyone of course, but he’s even found himself vaguely intimidated by her on occasion; she has this way of making you imagine in detail all the different ways she could probably literally tear your arm off, without ever having to say a word. She’s certainly a valuable ally. Hux needs her.

The other Stormtroopers have discreetly shuffled themselves into the space vacated by their fellow soldier. Ren has not moved. A thin trail of blood seeps through his fingers, running over his glove and down his arm. Hux notices he's lost his cloak somewhere, and he’d be lying if he said he isn’t glad to see it gone - it was tattered and burnt, and highly against Order regulations. Ren’s overcoat and tunic are torn over one shoulder, revealing an ugly, cauterized burn gashing up over his neck and face. A pity, because on the few occasions Hux’s had to see his face he’s always found him attractive in a sort of abstract way. Until he opened his mouth, that is.

The exposed flesh on the edges of the brand is raw and red. Dripping. Ren doesn’t appear to be breathing. It’s really quiet.

“Are you. Meditating?” Hux tries after a moment. He isn’t very knowledgable on the subject, but it seems like something Force users would do.

Ren lifts his head to glare at him, doesn’t even bother with words but just makes a sort of low enraged snarl, like some kind of wounded animal warning him to stay away. 

“Oh shut up, Ren,” Hux fires back, because he is stressed and tired and  absolutely the kind of person to kick someone when they’re down, “ You did this. To yourself, to all of us.”

In his mind he sees again the slowly expanding ring of space rubble that once was Starkiller Base, his life’s work destroyed by a single X-wing in what has to be the most ironic instance of history repeating itself the galaxy has ever seen.  Hux feels something almost like a physical pain in his chest thinking about it.

“You blame me,” is Ren’s soft response, more of a statement than a question. He’s glowering up at Hux from under his brows, but Hux is not intimidated. 

“ _I_ wasn't the one who jeopardized a military operation five years in the making because of his twisted need to commit patricide,” he reminds Ren, and the more he thinks about it, the more worked up he gets. Holding back has never been one of his talents, and he’s had a really bad fucking day, so, “You killed an old man, allowing his furry companion to blow up my oscillator, which you could have prevented if you had just done your job instead of focusing all of our resources on finding Han Solo, and then you let your emotions get so out of control you couldn't even stop an untrained scavenger from nearly killing you. As usual, you put your own personal vendetta above the needs of the Order,”

Ren’s face slowly starts to twist into a scowl, his frown deforming the burn over his cheek and nose into a jagged zig-zag shape.  It feels colder suddenly, like the temperature in the shuttle has somehow dropped a few degrees. The hair on the back of Hux’s neck stands on end, goosebumps racing down his arms. He writes it off as irritation.

“You lost your precious map,” Hux presses on, crossing his arms over his chest, “You let the only people who know anything about it escape.”

Behind him he can hear the Stormtroopers shifting uneasily. They seem scared. Hux isn’t scared, not of Kylo Ren’s anger.

“And you let a young girl without any knowledge of the Force whatsoever nearly sever your head with a lightsaber,” he finishes, thinking he’s done an adequate job of summarizing the situation and waiting for Ren to refute his claims. And it really is cold in the shuttle now, not just his imagination. Despite Ren’s seething glare, Hux finds himself shivering, and fights the urge to draw his coat around him.

He’s been on the receiving end of Ren’s anger more than once, but this is new. Probably some kind of Force bullshit. He might find it interesting if he weren’t so wound up, but he is badly in need of a punching bag right now, and Ren will do just fine for a target, danger signs or no.

So he looks Kylo Ren straight in the eye (something he’s not had the opportunity to do very often), and goes for the kill: “In fact the only question that remains is how you could possibly consider yourself a worthy successor to Darth Vader.”

Ren snarls and flings out one hand, and Hux suddenly finds himself lifted off the ground by some unseen power, invisible coils of  _ something  _ closing around his throat like thick, heavy fingers and  _ squeezing _ and Hux scrabbles against it, tugging and pulling, but he can’t find purchase against something that isn’t there. He gags, panic clouding his mind as he realizes he can’t breathe. 

His feet slide hopelessly against the floor, boots scrambling but not quite reaching the metal surface of the shuttle. His hat tumbles to the floor and he kicks it accidentally, sending it skittering to the other side of the shuttle.

And alright. He’ll admit that maybe he pushed too far this time. He and Ren have never had what one could call a healthy working relationship, but maybe going after Vader was a dig too deep even for Hux, knowing how Ren feels about his predecessor. Ren’s power clouds all around him, thick enough to be an almost physical presence, a fog of the Force clinging to Hux’s skin and clothes. It swells inside the small shuttle and presses against the bulkheads, making the lights set in the ceiling flicker manically to the very disconcerting sound of steel expanding. 

And. Oh.  _ Oh _ . Hux knew Ren was powerful, certainly, but this... He peers at him through eyes blurry with tears, his throat convulsing compulsively around “Ren, stop,” or maybe “Ren, please,”, but all that comes out is a kind of strangled moan. 

His vision starts fading, black spots dancing in front of his eyes, and he can’t quite find the strength in his arms to keep pulling at the weight around his throat, so he resigns himself to just kind of holding on. He’s sure Ren must be able to hear his heart pounding from over there.

Ren is so close to the edge Hux thinks he might actually kill him. Ren’s power is still all around him, all  _ over _ him, and now that his defenses are down, he can feel it uncurling inside his chest, blooming up along his spine and into his head like a slowly-plumeing mushroom cloud. And this is just a fraction of Ren’s true power…

Hux has to admit that he’s never put much stock in all this Force business. He’s heard the rumours, of course - Kylo Ren destroyed an entire village by himself to get to one Jedi. Kylo Ren can hold blaster fire with the power of his mind. Kylo Ren can pull the thoughts straight out of your head in the most painful ways imaginable - but now that Hux is on the receiving end of that power for the first time, he finds himself awed at its sheer immensity.

His lungs are burning, his head pounding with every frantic, skipping heartbeat. He thinks he’s starting to understand what the Supreme Leader saw in Ren. He might be starting to get a bit delirious, but oh, the things Hux could do if he held that power in his hands… Nothing would be able to stop him. His sight blacks out completely for a second, and in the darkness he has fleeting visions of himself as the Emperor, the final word in the law of the galaxy, millions of soldiers arrayed below him in ranks of black and white like an exaggerated version of his speech on Starkiller Base, and every shore on every sea on all the planets in the galaxy painted red with the blood of anyone who stands in his way.

To have so much power at the tips of his fingers… The vision of his own ascendance, an absolute rule enforced by the Master of the Knights of Ren, strikes him with such overwhelming intensity in the small, dark space his mind has become that he feels his cock stirring, arousal washing over him in a wave of heat. The air thrums around him, Ren’s power dancing like electricity over his skin. He gags on a moan.

A small part of the back of his mind wakes up at the sound. No. He refuses. This is not how he’s planning on dying. Not at Kylo Ren’s hands and certainly not with a fucking hard-on tenting his pants, no matter how alluring Ren’s power is. Hux pries his eyes open and uses his last remaining strength to glare at him.

H e isn’t sure to what extent Ren can really read minds, but he must have  picked up on Hux’s arousal at least somewhat because his ridiculously expressive face looks almost comically confused. He stares at Hux as if he’s grown a second head, and suddenly the pressure around Hux’s neck is gone, Ren’s hand slowly lowering to his side. His power retracts almost violently, slipping back into him like water down a drain. Hux drops to the floor onto his knees in the sudden void, hard, gulping down deep gasps of breath and tugging at the stiff collar of his uniform, his vision going white before slowly speckling back into colour. The lights stop flickering. Somewhere a valve has popped open and is hissing.

Ren is still staring at him with that same dumb expression, and embarrassment washes over Hux. He’s still heaving rasping breaths, but gets to his feet, grateful that his uniform’s overcoat covers his crotch. Humiliating. He deliberately stares Ren right in the eye, challenging him to say something, anything, because Hux already has one hand on the handblaster at his thigh and can draw in under a half a second. But Ren says nothing; only looks at him with those absurdly soft eyes of his, visibly schooling his face into an unreadable expression. The jagged burn settles into a semi-straight arc over his nose, the edges bright and scalding.

Hux turns his back on him and draws himself to his full height. He glares at the Stormtroopers for good measure, sure that his face must be a mortifying shade of red. He almost wants one of them to say something too, but of course they don’t. Fucking cowards.

With a final scowl at Ren, Hux leans down to grab his hat and jams it onto his head, walking to the cockpit of the shuttle with all the dignity he can muster, ignoring the burn in his chest and the slow pulse of arousal further down. He ducks past the Stormtrooper at the communications panel and flings himself down in the empty co-pilot’s seat, glaring out the viewport. The cold, blue streaks of hyperspace tint the whole cabin in shades of turquoise and silver, but Hux is too disgruntled to find much beauty in it.

Neither the pilot nor the ‘trooper behind them dares say a word.

The General has had a fair number of bad days in his life, but today might just be the worst of all of them. And that was  _ before _ he got a hard-on thinking about that idiot. But… He allows himself to indulge for just a moment in the memory of Ren’s power all around him, reaching up to brush his fingers over his throat lightly. It was magnificent. All that power, in the palm of Snoke’s hand. If Hux could control it instead…

But no. That is a dangerous train of thought, one that leads nowhere good. Ren practically worships his Supreme Leader, has done ever since he was a child. His power belongs to Snoke. Hux has to trust the Supreme Leader will use it wisely.

Putting the thought firmly out of his mind, he closes his eyes against the streaking star trails outside the viewport and rests his head back, letting his mind drift.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic represents a lot of firsts for me:
> 
> My first Kylux :)  
> The first *anything* I've written in 4 years.  
> My first Big Bang.  
> The first time ever I've written anything this length.  
> And by extension, my first multi-chapter fic.  
> My first time writing in this style.
> 
> I just had such an enormous amount of fun writing this, I guess it ran away with me a bit. And I realize I'm incredibly rusty and, this being the first time I've tried plot-driven writing, it has many, many flaws and is just really all over the place, wildly OOC and incoherent sometimes (and oh god I am SO SHIT AT WRITING SEX), but I had an absolute blast with it. Reading it now, of course, I hate almost every word of this childish, trope-y nonsense and just want to delete the whole thing :) But sitting down with an idea, plotting it, and forcing myself to write it was a great experience, and I think there's value in it if just for that.
> 
> Many thanks to May for betaing chapters 1 and 2~


	2. Some things are just not covered by the First Order’s standard health plan

_ He’s standing on some kind of beach, rough sand like fine shards of glass tearing into his bare feet. All the world around him is a vague grey-black, except for a single glowing pinpoint in the sky, bright red and growing as it falls towards him. There are no stars tonight, just that singular crimson blaze, so big now that it fills the entire sky, and hotter than anything Hux could imagine. The dry roar of white noise drowns out all sound, and as he looks up at the beam from the Starkiller, about to swallow his world in fire and violence, he feels only a sense of calmness, of his fate finally caught up with him. He can’t remember the last time he felt this peaceful. With a smile he closes his eyes to the blinding red light and heat terrible enough to peel the skin off his flesh-- _

“General.”

The soft voice of the pilot wakes Hux an indeterminate time later. He’s slumped uncomfortably in the co-pilot’s seat, the back of his coat crumpled behind his lower back and pushing his spine into a sharp curve that is certainly not healthy. His eyes open slowly. Outside the shuttle’s viewport, the stars have solidified into a spattering of silver dust. Right in front of them hangs a slowly-rotating planet, trailed lazily by two small moons. 

He hadn’t meant to drift off; certainly hadn’t thought it possible to, being irritated, embarrassed and still vaguely aroused, but here they are, about to enter orbit around what is apparently the planet the Supreme Leader sent them coordinates to. He must be more worn out than he thought.

The pilot seems to be awaiting orders from him, so Hux nods and has to clear his throat before instructing, “Take us down.”

He slowly takes stock of his body: His lower back feels disjointed, one arm tingling as he untraps it from between his side and the armrest, and his neck aches. The stiff collar of his Order uniform rubs uncomfortably over the swollen bruises left by Kylo Ren. He reaches up unconsciously to press against his throat, testing the injury, and remembers Ren’s eyes as he glared up at him, murderous and black. His body’s response to the thought is shamefully immediate, and he quickly pushes the image from his mind.

Fighting a groan, he sits up, pushing his hat back into place where it’s slid down slightly over one eye. His tongue feels too thick, and it’s hard to swallow. He’d kill for a drink; some water, or even better, something with a ridiculously high alcohol content. Willing the last fluff of sleep from his mind, he blinks a few times to clear his vision and turns his gaze to the viewport as the shuttle starts its descent.

The planet looks like a perfectly rolled ball of moss from here, the light reflecting off it tinting the shiny chrome surfaces of the shuttle’s interior silvery green. No sight of any large bodies of water, mountains, or anything to otherwise break the vast mass of... trees? It is, however, slashed through by deep, criss-crossing swaths of grey, which, as they draw closer, Hux recognizes as the veiny tributaries and deltas of wide, muddy rivers. And yes, trees. Lots and lots of trees. Hux sighs internally. Trees mean wildlife. And insects. Nature; fantastic.

He leans forward in his seat to peer down at the surface, reaching out to brace one hand against the control panel for balance as the planet’s atmosphere throws the shuttle out of the calm drift of space and into a turbulent descent.

The black and silver of space turns into grey, then pink and finally the bright blue of daylight, the shuttle shaking with the drastic change in air pressure outside. It’s a bit rougher going than usual, the pilot fighting for stability against the damaged engine, and now that they’ve hit oxygenated air again the high-pitched wail of the sputtering power source starts up once more. It grates on Hux’s nerves, not least because it makes him nervous about their chances of surviving landfall.

Green rushes up to meet them entirely too fast. Hux feels his stomach climb up to his throat, adrenaline flooding his system. He buckles himself in nervously, then clutches onto the panel in front of him tightly, trying very hard not to let on how scared he feels. One of these days he’s going to get over his fear of flying. But not today, apparently. (And it’s not the flying he’s scared of anyway, not really. It’s the potential for falling that troubles him, and oh, look, here they are, hurtling towards the ground at approximately light speed, because of course that’s exactly how Hux was planning on dying - surviving his childhood, his turbulent rise through the ranks to General, and the destruction of a planet he was still on at the time, only to die by ingloriously crash landing some pathetic shuttle on some backwater planet in the middle of nowhere, following some ridiculous orders from some wrinkled goblin whom he’s never even seen in person. This is really so typical of Hux’s life.)

To the pilot’s credit, they land with what Hux will grudgingly admit is minimal difficulty. Aiming for a clearing that seemed to be approximately two square centimetres across from higher up, the hull of the shuttle scrapes and crashes through a thick canopy of branches and leaves and vines, loud snaps and cracks accompanying the scratching of splintered boughs against the metal hull. The safety belt cuts into Hux’s stomach painfully. They ricochet against a particularly solid tree and impact the ground almost sideways, the shuttle teetering dangerously to the right before dropping with a loud boom onto its keel and skidding to a halt almost exactly in the center of the clearing they’d aimed for. 

When Hux manages to quiet the panicked screaming in his head long enough to realize they’re all still alive, he makes a mental note to give the pilot a promotion when they get back to the Finalizer. He takes a deep breath, exhales in a long shudder. The metal hull of the shuttle is hissing and popping as it cools, and a cloud of nearly black smoke envelopes them thickly, making it hard to discern anything outside the viewport.

Hux risks a glance at the pilot. He seems only mildly perturbed, flicking switches and pressing buttons to deactivate the engines and starting the sequence to power down the shuttle. He’s entirely too calm. Asshole.

Outside the viewport the smoke is letting up a bit, and Hux starts to make out some details. The clearing they’ve landed in is in the proximity of what looks like the ruins of an old, crumbling temple, overgrown with vines and giant, leafy plants with bright yellow flowers. It’s half hidden in the undergrowth, flashes of tinted glass windows and one stubborn spire still obstinately thrusting up through the trees the only things to give it away. 

Something tugs at the back of Hux’s mind. He’s heard rumours of a place of sanctuary, whispered by First Order officers on their lunch breaks in the crowded mess hall of the Finalizer. They say it used to be a Jedi temple or some such. Hux doesn’t indulge in heresay, and wouldn’t know a Jedi temple from a B'omarr Monastery anyway, but he supposes it makes sense for Snoke to have something of a safe house.

And so this would be what is on this random planet in the Eastern quadrant of Star-forming region Sh 2-106: Supreme Leader Snoke’s infamous Lost Citadel. But what are they doing here now? Why has Snoke ordered Hux to bring Ren here at a time like this? They’ve just lost one of their biggest weapons to the Resistance (his chest aches with a pang of regret). Someone in as prominent a position as the Supreme Leader should be rallying the armies of the First Order and planning a retaliatory attack, not hiding in the rubble on some backwater planet.

With these thoughts clouding his mind, he unbuckles himself and gets up out of the co-pilot’s seat, takes a moment to steady himself when his vision swims - goddamn Ren and his goddamn Force powers - and makes his way to the aft of the shuttle. His coat is wrinkled from being bunched up behind him when he slept, so he does his best to smooth it out, tugging at the sleeves to try and straighten them.

Ren is somehow standing, though Hux can’t imagine how. His torn overcoat clings wetly to his side, the metal bench where he’d been sitting stained an ugly brown with dried blood. He visibly trembles as he makes his way, step by carefully controlled step, towards the airlock, none of the usual intensity present in his posture. 

The sight of him takes Hux aback slightly. He’s found Ren objectively attractive before, sure, in the very brief moments when he wasn’t too preoccupied with hating him. But seeing him like this, broken and wrecked, his clothes in bloody tatters and his hair hanging over his eyes... Fuck. It’s incredibly hot. It awakens something primal in Hux, something he’s very rarely felt before and doesn’t welcome. He scowls, because no. Ren did something to him with the Force when he choked him, Hux is sure of it. Played some kind of perverted trick on his mind. That’s the only explanation.

The Stormtroopers have unbuckled themselves and are getting up, but none of them dare come near Ren to support him, and Hux sure as hell isn’t going to give him the satisfaction. He can feel his face starting to redden again just looking at him, so he pushes past him to the airlock, barely resisting the urge to shoulder him aside.

Folding his hands behind his back, he pushes Ren from his mind as a Stormtrooper releases the airlock doors with a hiss. They slide open smoothly, the steel embarking ramp unfolding and sliding to the ground. It’s width spans the aft of the shuttle, big enough for four men abreast.

Hux is immediately hit in the face by a wave of wet heat. It’s thick enough for him to have to work at breathing, each inhale stretching the bruises on his neck painfully. Of course Snoke has to hide out in the hottest fucking rainforest in the entire galaxy. The area around the clearing is crowded with massive trees and tropical ferns, ropey vines tangling through enormous branches rife with the echoing calls of birds and frogs. Somewhere in the distance is the faint roar of one of the rivers they’d seen from above. Some cicada-like insects Hux is unfamiliar with scream bloody murder into the dappled sunlight.

A thin haze of brown smoke still hangs around them, the smell of burnt metal and ash overriding the natural, mossy scent of the forest.

Whomever designed the First Order officers’ uniforms clearly made them to withstand the perpetual cold of space: they are woefully unequipped against the thick, humid heat of a jungle. Hux is immediately covered in a thin sheen of sweat, and wishes he’d had the foresight to leave his thick wrinkled coat in the cockpit.

He hates this planet already.

Next to him, Ren’s hands are clenched in fists at his side. He’s staring out the airlock with this sort of quiet intensity. He doesn’t seem bothered by the heat, though Hux supposes his wounds might possibly be a bit distracting. He’s extremely pale.

The ramp hits the floor of the clearing - a kind of mossy, muddy sludge, Hux notes in distaste, it must have been raining recently - and he leads the squadron of ‘troopers down the ramp, their boots thumping on the steel. Ren trails behind more slowly.

They have a welcoming committee. Four mysterious figures, clad entirely in black, their faces hidden by masks of a familiar design. The Knights of Ren, or some of them, anyway. Of course they’d be here. Hux doesn’t know why he thought his day might actually get  _ better _ . 

The Knights are flanked by Stormtroopers, their armour untraditionally and very non-regulatory black. Snoke’s own personal Guard. Hux counts ten ‘troopers, one full squadron. He checks the clearing, assuming that the amount of noise they crashed down with will have brought everyone in range out to see what the commotion was, but no one else makes themselves known. The Supreme Leader must feel secure on this planet, if one squadron and four Knights are what he considers protection. The acrid smoke from the shuttle makes his eyes burn.

Of course, there may be other ‘troopers hidden in the forest. He wouldn’t put it past the Supreme Leader to have snipers in the trees, and really, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to assume that Snoke might want him dead for the loss of Starkiller Base. The weapon was Hux’s responsibility, after all, and he let it blow up literally right underneath him. Now that he’s brought Kylo Ren here, what further use does the Supreme Leader have of General Hux?

But the voice of reason in the back of his head tells him he’s being paranoid. Exhaustion tends to bring that out in him. It’s not a trait he’s proud of. His eyes flick nervously to the trees anyway, but i t’s useless trying to make anything out in the thick foliage around the clearing, so he returns his gaze to the four Knights. 

There are at least six in total, he knows. God knows where the other two are. He has all of their names written down somewhere in his records, but they’ve never been important enough to warrant his full attention, not being affiliated to the First Order officially and having never been under Hux’s command.

The one on the far right, possibly a female, has a small handblaster strapped to her side and seems to be the nominated leader of these particular four, by the way she stands a little to the front of the others. The Knight to her left is as tall as she is short, his mask vaguely resembling a grinning skull. Hux fights the urge to roll his eyes - seems the flair for melodrama is strong with all the Knights, not just his own personal pain in the ass, Kylo Ren. The remaining two are of equal height and build and wear identical masks, mirror reflections of one another except for their weapons - one rests some kind of long scimitar on the mossy ground, the other veritably covered in strange cylinders and dark metal spheres Hux can only assume are grenades of some kind.

Hux draws himself up, folding his hands behind his back in parade rest, a long stream of sweat dripping down the side of his temple and running over his chin. He has a headache. 

He stays silent, expecting some kind of welcome, or a formal greeting at least - he is a General after all, if perhaps not their direct superior - but the Knights ignore him, their masks collectively turned to stare past him toward Kylo Ren as if Hux wasn’t even there. He supposes they’re either using some kind of Force-based fucking mind talk, or just trying to be creepy for effect. If they’re anything like their Master it’s most likely the second.

Something screeches somewhere in the forest, possibly being eaten. Hux looks at the Knights looking at Ren, and the silence stretches awkwardly but for a strange kind of buzzing in the back of Hux’s head. It’s not a sound, not exactly, but more of a feeling, a low vibration tickling at the very base of his skull. He wonders if he’s feeling Ren talk to them somehow, with the Force.

Then Ren steps forward toward them, and the Knights gather around him like some kind of honour guard. Without a word, they lead Ren away from the shuttle. Hux hopes they will atleast have his wounds looked at before he just crumples and dies right on the spot, because he most definitely did not go through all the trouble of getting him here just to have him keel over from some kind of infection.

So here Hux is, flanked by his Stormtroopers, facing off with Snoke’s lot, on a hot, sweltering planet in god knows what remote system, trying not to melt in a pool of sweat and discontent while Kylo Ren is off getting some kind of fucking spa treatment in the Supreme Leader’s Citadel. 

To be honest, he’s at a bit of a loss for what to do. He has to speak to Snoke. They have to start planning a retaliation against the Resistance. He needs to get back to the Finalizer to oversee the fallout after Starkiller Base’s destruction and find out where the hell Captain Phasma is. The Stormtroopers from the shuttle are waiting for some kind of command from him, shuffling behind him in the heat, but Snoke’s guard stand in neat rows as if  rooted, making no move to give Hux any sort of hint as to what will happen next. Frustrating. Hux doesn’t like not knowing what to do. He lives his life on a strict chain of command; things have to be done by the book, precisely conforming to his very strict personal policies and rules. Not… this. 

He gestures curtly for one of the black-clad ‘troopers. The Stormtrooper must see the expression on Hux’s face because he creeps forward almost hesitantly.  

Hux glares. “Where is Supreme Leader Snoke? I demand to see him,”

The Stormtrooper visibly flinches. “Sorry, sir. Direct orders from Leader Snoke. No one but Kylo Ren…”

Of course. Fucking Kylo Ren and his fucking--- “Fine. Then direct me to your living quarters. My men need to rest, recuperate before we head back to the Finalizer.” He doesn’t add that he would kill for a shower right now. His uniform grows stuffier by the second, and a second trail of sweat has joined the first, trailing over his cheek from under his hat.

The Stormtrooper shifts his weight, fidgeting with his blaster rifle. “Sir, we… that is… We’ve just set up camp outside.”

Hux stares. “You must be joking.”

The way the Stormtrooper’s helmet tilts around to look anywhere except Hux tells him that he isn’t, in fact, joking. “Access to the Citadel,” the ‘trooper continues hesitantly, “has been forbidden to anyone except the Knights,”

Hux stares at the ‘trooper, then lets his gaze travel around the clearing, where, now that the smoke from the shuttle has mostly cleared, he notices holosail tents and large ration boxes stacked in neat piles that probably double as temporary seats.

He takes this all in and manages by extreme effort of will not to shoot every single black-clad ‘trooper on the spot.

“Why.” It comes out as a statement more than a question. Hux is actually quite proud of how controlled his voice sounds.

The ‘trooper just kind of shrugs, the black armour plates on his shoulders scraping against his chestplate. The others in his squadron shuffle around a bit, all but physically backing away from their fellow soldier under Hux’s scowl.

He hopes his glare gets the message across as he turns on his heel without a further word and stalks up the ramp back into the shuttle, which he supposes will have to do for sleeping quarters until they can get off this godforsaken planet. 

This is all highly against regulation.  _ Camping _ in the galaxy’s most humid rainforest, filled with all manner of crawling insect life and probably some predators Hux isn’t even prepared to wonder about. He wouldn’t be caught dead.

He’s almost embarrassingly relieved by the cold air of space clinging to the inside of the shuttle, inhaling deeply through his nose and exhaling slowly through his mouth, closing his eyes and just reveling in it for a moment. Well. It won’t help to just sit around and do nothing. He remembers he’d ordered a ‘trooper to contact the Finalizer, and wonders if she managed to get through.

Shrugging out of his coat, he folds it neatly and lays it down on one of the metal benches - not the one stained with Ren’s blood, and someone is going to have to clean that sooner rather than later - before making his way to the cockpit of the shuttle to check the communications panel set in the bulkhead for messages from the Finalizer. 

Starkiller Base fills up the holo display with hundreds of notifications: mostly  damage reports, which he doesn’t open yet, and a blinking body count in the top right corner, which he ignores with the firm resolve of an accountant, tallying the fallen soldiers and officers against the countless Resistance lives he himself took. Nothing from Phasma yet. Worrying.

He slips his hat off, running a hand through his hair before pushing it back into place. It will likely be a while before they can get back to the Finalizer. Hux is no technician, but even he can see the shuttle has been damaged badly. It got them here in one piece - a true testament to the engineering brilliance of the First Order - but it’s unlikely it would survive hyperspace again unless they can get the broken engine fixed. He sighs, tapping in the command to send a comm up to the Finalizer. Asking for any kind of assistance from anyone, at any time, goes against his grain in the worst way, but he’s also a practical man, and above all recognizes his position as General and the fact that the First Order needs him to run damage control in the aftermath of the attack.

The comms fizzle to life with a static hiss of white noise when they connect to the Finalizer.

“This is General Hux of the First Order requesting transport to the Finalizer from my current location.” He reads their coordinates off the bottom right corner of the screen.

Mitaka’s voice comes through, faint and broken over the vast distance.

“Sir, goo--- hear your voice. We’ve all been wor--- safety.”

‘Worried for his safety’. Hux rolls his eyes. If the crew he’d left in charge of his ship were actually worried about anything, he’s willing to bet, it’s which of them would take over Hux’s command once they found him to have ‘abandoned’ his position. But the Finalizer is his ship, and he’ll keep her if he has to go through her entire eighty-thousand-odd crew to do so. 

So he just says, curtly, “I’m fine,” because if he starts listing all the things that are  _ not _ fine he’ll be here all day, “Send the shuttle.”

“Sorry, si--- available shuttles are all --- take a few days.”

A few days. The thought of staying in this rainforest for even an hour causes a vein to throb painfully in his temple. A few days. Days during which any one of those bloodthirsty usurpers could take advantage of the chaos the Finalizer’s crew undoubtedly found themselves in without Hux’s strong hand to guide them and seize the ship for themselves. Under no circumstances.

They’ll have to fix the shuttle themselves, then, with whatever resources available. And by “they”, he means the Stormtroopers. There has got to be at least one with some engineering knowledge in his squadron. 

Changing tactics with Mitaka, he asks the question that has been forefront in his mind: “Where is Captain Phasma?”

“No one’s seen--- since the explosion, sir. We don’t---” Mitaka crackles into static.

“Find her,” Hux says, “I want her to report back to me about the status of our army. We had a lot of Stormtroopers on Starkiller Base. I need to know what we have to work with now.”

“Sir,” Mitaka affirms.

“And I didn’t see any reports on the current position of the Resistance in the communications you sent down. The intelligence on their coordinates was lost with Starkiller’s data banks. Tell me someone had the foresight to follow those infernal X-wings back to whatever godforsaken hole they crawled out of?”

There’s a long few seconds of white noise before Mitaka responds, “Sir, we were busy--- evacuation. All hands were--- we couldn’t spare---”

Busy. Too busy to follow the wretches who destroyed Hux’s world.

Pinching the bridge of his nose against his headache, he replies, “You couldn’t spare one Tie fighter to trail them back to their base? You let an opportunity like that slip through your fingers just because I was not on the bridge to give the order? Is reconnaissance a completely foreign concept to you people?” He practically barks the last into the comm, realizing full well that he’s taking his anger out on the one person who probably genuinely was on his side, but not able to stop himself.

He doesn’t wait for Mitaka to respond. “Find me Phasma, find the Resistance pilots who blew up my planet, and bring me the head of the traitor FN-2187.”

“Ye---”

“And send out a broadcast on the open channel. Tell the crew to expect me back on board post haste, and that there will be hell to pay if my ship isn’t running at full capacity by that time.”

He cuts the open comm link, stepping back to half-sit on the backrest of the pilot’s seat, tilting his head back and rolling his aching neck. In his mind he pictures receiving the traitor’s actual head, perhaps presented in a metal box, blood dripping from the stump of its severed neck as he lifts it out by the ears to stare into its dead eyes. A fitting end for a treacherous snake. 

The sound of someone clearing their throat softly draws his attention. One of his Stormtroopers is standing slightly ducked down beneath the entryway to the cockpit. 

“Sir,” the ‘trooper murmurs, and Hux recognizes his voice as the pilot who got them to this planet, “Er. It’s just that the men. Are wondering what to do next.”

“Yes, I suppose they would be,” Hux replies, foregoing to mention that he was just wondering that himself. He straightens up, ducking past the ‘trooper and back through the cool shuttle to the suffocating heat and muggy, oppressive air outside. The Supreme Leader’s Guard is gone, apart from two Stormtroopers busying themselves with what looks like unpacking weapons from one of the crates. Hux’s own squadron of ‘troopers are still arrayed on the ramp where he left them, stacked in two neat rows of four. He walks down the center of the ramp between them, hands clasped behind his back, and turns to face them at the bottom.

“Is any of you at all skilled in mechanical repairs?” he demands in their direction, automatically adopting the authoritative tone he uses for speech-giving. One ‘trooper hesitantly raises their hand, another, two heads down, responding “yes, sir!”

“Very well. You two will restore this shuttle to full working order within a day’s time. Leader Snoke’s Guard will furnish you with the supplies you need.” At least, Hux assumes this will not be a problem, unless Leader Snoke’s Guard wish to come face to face with Hux’s ire, something not many Stormtroopers have survived to tell tales of.

The first Stormtrooper’s still-raised arm lowers slightly. Hux just knows he is about to be disappointed.

“General. Sir. One day… I’m not sure that will be enough---”

Hux cuts him off by way of the dangerous end of his handblaster coming to rest lightly on the ‘trooper’s helmet, right over the eye slit where he’s sure it won’t be missed.

“Try. Again.” 

The ‘trooper’s helmet trembles visibly. Predictably, he doesn’t try again.

“General Hux.” 

It’s the pilot, coming up to Hux slowly and carefully with his hands held up in a gesture of peace, “Please. All due respect.The work will go twice as slowly if he's dead...”

Hux supposes the man has a point. He lowers his blaster, but finds he still has the very strong urge to shoot something. It only takes him a second to weigh the cons of incapacitating one of his soldiers against the pros of the instant gratification he would get from doing so, and instant gratification wins. He aims at the shin guard of the ‘trooper in front of him and fires. The pilot flinches, half raising his hands to cover his face as the Stormtrooper yells in surprise, doubling over and clutching at his leg. Blood seeps over the pristine white, rivuleting down over his fingers to pool on the top of his boot. It’s splattered onto the thigh guard of the pilot, who, lowering his arms, is staring at Hux in terror (or so Hux likes to imagine, not being able to see his face under the mask).

“You don’t need both legs to make the repairs, soldier,” Hux frowns at the fallen Stormtrooper, holstering his blaster, “I suggest you get started on them before I decide you don’t need both hands, either.”

“Sir,” the ‘trooper manages, still holding onto his leg, breathing in tight wheezes through the mask.

Hux turns to the pilot, who frankly seems to be the only sane thing in Hux’s life right now. “You.”

“General,” the ‘trooper jumps slightly, then straightens automatically, hand snapping to the side of his helmet in a smart salute.

“What is your designation?”

“XN-336, sir.”

Hux makes a mental note. XN-336. Promotion. Possibly to lieutenant.

“Very well, XN-336. You’re in charge here. See to it that the shuttle is repaired with utmost haste and do not. Under any circumstances. Let a single of these men out of your sight. Yes?”

XN-336 salutes again. 

Hux turns on his heel to face the clearing and stops. The Knights of Ren have returned, sitting by themselves in a little group off to the side of the clearing on some stacked ration boxes. Kylo Ren is not with them. Hux’s eyes flick to what is visible of the Citadel from here. Access restricted to anyone but the Knights, was it? But here they all are, meaning the Citadel is empty except for Snoke and Ren. 

With the Stormtroopers fixing the shuttle and Mitaka still looking for Phasma, there’s little else for Hux to do but sit and stew in his own sweat. Or he could disobey the Supreme Leader’s orders, storm into the Citadel, probably interrupting whatever secret meeting he was having with Kylo Ren, and demand an audience.

Hux resents being told he can’t do something. A great part of his childhood was spent investing way more hours than necessary practising things he was told he would never be able to do, just out of spite. He certainly isn’t about to stop that trend now. And when he’s finished, he’s going to demand approximately seventeen litres of water and an entire bottle of whiskey from Snoke’s Guard.

Mind firmly made up, he tugs on the lapels of his coat to straighten them and turns towards the Citadel.


	3. Strange men sitting in ponds distributing lightsabers is no basis for a system of government

Overhead, the sky has darkened to a kind of muddy brown, pregnant clouds billowing in from the West on a fast, strong wind to hang low overhead, threatening to break at any moment. In the distance, the faint rumble of thunder draws closer.

Hux stalks through the middle of the clearing, between ration boxes and holosail tents and various Stormtroopers, towards where he can just see the top of the tall spire of the Citadel, rising like a silent sentinel out of the forest canopy. The Knights of Ren in their little clique all turn to stare at Hux as he passes, their masks turning silently to follow his progress through the clearing. He tries to ignore the way they make his skin crawl, curling his hands into fists and resisting the urge to hurry his steps.

When he reaches the end of the clearing he has to stop. Trees block the Citadel from here; large trunks covered in pugnant moss and vines and the zigzagging leaves of giant ferns rustling slightly in the breeze. The wall of foliage stretches around the clearing; there is no path immediately visible to the Citadel. Hux stares at it. Do the Knights just… battle their way through the vines and undergrowth to get to Leader Snoke? He has some difficulty imagining any of them hacking away at the branches with a machete to clear the way, and besides, all of the branches and leaves in front of him seem whole and unbroken.

No. There must be something he’s missing.

He’s been staring (scowling) at the plant barrier for a good few minutes, hands planted firmly on his hips, when movement to the right catches his eye. He turns his head in time to see a black-clad Stormtrooper exit the woods through a small, narrow gap in the trees to the side of the clearing. A path? He glances between the opening and the trees in front of him.

Now that he’s aware of it, it seems quite obvious. He’s not sure why he didn’t notice it before. He blames his pounding head, the humid, oppressive air, and the Supreme Leader’s Guard for being deceitful in general.

In his defense, it does seem counterintuitive. A path in that direction would lead _away_ from the Citadel, not towards it. But there is the Stormtrooper, slinging his rifle over his back and making his way towards a holosail tent, and Hux doesn’t see any other exits from this place, so he figures he doesn’t have anything to lose by trying it. He walks over, takes one last look towards what is visible of the Citadel peeking through the trees, and steps into the path.

It’s as if he’s swallowed by a whole different world, dark and vaguely sinister, echoing bird calls and cicadas loud all around him. Sunlight can’t quite make it through the thick canopy of leaves, and what little light does is constantly shifting, shadows bleeding and bending as the leaves shift in the wind and he thinks that if ever there was a natural habitat perfectly suited for the brooding Kylo Ren, this is it. The air seems even more stifling and thick here, if possible, matted leaves and moss on the ground muting his steps and making for slippery going as he trudges along the path.

And of course, it starts to rain. Because he clearly hasn’t been inconvenienced quite enough yet today. He hears it pattering on the top canopy of the forest, not hard enough to break through to the ground, but soon the leaves and branches are dripping incessantly, and before long Hux is completely drenched. The only mercy is that it helps to cool him down by a fraction of a degree, but only really when the slight breeze picks up.

The walk takes him longer than he expected. The path twists and turns, winding in and through and around trees, so narrow at times that his hands brush the foliage. He hasn't had to do a forest run since bootcamp, and now he remembers why he used to hate them. He swats furiously at something that buzzes entirely too close to his ear, wishing for the cool, angular lines and distinct lack of fauna of the Finalizer.

With the path curling around itself like a snake and being unable to pinpoint the location of the sun through the trees, it isn't long before he's lost all indication of which direction he is going. It feels like he’s been tramping through this forest for roughly a year, though he supposes it can’t have been more than half an hour. His hair is plastered to his forehead under the hat with sweat and rain, his jodhpurs clinging uncomfortably to his thighs. He shuts up when he realizes he's been muttering to himself.

He’s about to give up and turn back when the last trees before him part and, pushing a fern leaf broader than he is tall aside, he emerges into a shadowy glade. He exhales a sigh of exasperated relief. _Finally_.

In front of him rise the tall brick walls of the Citadel, more broken down and crumbling than whole. Once-colourful glass windows are no more than shattered shards thrusting from their panes, and all that remains of the roof in most parts is the high-arching metal beams that once supported the domed ceiling of the main building, now crawled over with vines and moss.

The twisting spire he’d seen from the shuttle rises on the other side of the Citadel, only its very apex visible from this point. The forest has all but reclaimed this place. Hux wonders what it was, and more importantly, why the hell anyone would build anything in this ridiculous fucking jungle in the first place.

A plume of smoke catches his eye on the opposite side of the tall trees ringing the decaying building. It must be from the damaged shuttle. It’s literally right there. Why did he just walk what felt like a hundred kilometers to get here when camp was literally a stone’s throw away? Waste of energy. It would take one Stormtrooper to make a path through the trees. One. The sheer inefficiency of it feels like a personal affront. He adds “proper assignment of resources in outpost construction” to the long list of things he will address in his audience with the Supreme Leader.

He stalks up to the Citadel. Two of Snoke’s black-clad Guard have taken up position on either side of the large, arching doors. Their helmets turn to him as he comes up, postures straightening slightly.

“General Hux, sir,” the ‘trooper on the left greets as Hux comes to stand in front of him, “My apologies. No one but the Knights of---”

“Try and stop me from going inside,” Hux interrupts in the coldest tone of voice he can manage, throwing all his frustration and anger into what comes out as a kind of whispered growl, “Go on. I dare you.”

A long moment passes as the Stormtrooper stares at him, and Hux stares back. The soft patter of drizzle on the trees fills the silence, the birds quiet enough for the moment to make it seem like not even they want to interrupt. Hux does not back down, narrowing his eyes slightly. He’s practised this particular look and has found it to be highly effective in getting his way in the past.

He’s pleased to find it hasn’t lost its touch. The Stormtrooper sidles out of his way, clearing his throat uncomfortably as Hux pushes past through the doors.

He expects the inside of the Citadel to be dark and sombre, but it’s surprisingly light, the crumbling roof allowing some semblance of daylight and air (and yes, rain) into the ruins. The floor is covered in dead leaves, crumbled bits of brick, and shards of glass near the walls, the thickness and verdure of the ropey vines draping from the ceiling indicating that the building has probably been abandoned for many years.

Three holosail tents occupy most of the space in the entry hall, black and sturdy-looking, the ground around them littered with more ration boxes, a debris of metal gun components, and a black cloak haphazardly draped over what looks like a repulsor modulator. This will be where the Knights have set up camp, then. Three tents. Four Knights. He raises an eyebrow slightly.

Movement catches his eye to the left, where a very long, bright yellow and blue snake is lazily twisting around the remains of a decaying pillar. Hux is almost tempted to go for his blaster, but the snake isn’t acting inherently threatening (yet), and as long as it stays all the way over there, he can forgive its presence for the time being. He has more important things to be focusing on, anyway.

The layout of the Citadel is quite simple, if a bit tricky to navigate around the detritus of the Knights’ camp. The circular main building with its domed roof tapers into a long, narrow corridor on the opposite side of the entrance, wide enough for perhaps two thin people to walk abreast, a canopy of overgrowth acting as a makeshift ceiling where the real roof has rotted away.

The smell of decaying foliage hangs thick as a blanket around Hux. His boots thud dully on patches of dried ground where the roof overhead still holds, blocking the rain. He’s almost tempted to reach out and trail his hand along the brick wall as he goes, but changes his mind - there are probably all manner of spiders and cockroaches scuttling under the leafy patchwork sprouting between the stones. He suppresses a shudder. This place is frankly barbaric.

He passes two breaches in the wall to his right, which he supposes may have been doors once upon a time. They lead to empty chambers in much the same state of decay as the main hall, giving no clues as to their original intended purpose.

To the left at the end of the corridor, another opening catches his notice, mostly because of the presence of a set of very heavy wooden doors partly blocking the way. They seem out of place in the Citadel, too pristine to have been here from its abandonment, and too heavily made to be suited for a religious building. He steps closer, running a hand lightly over the weighty wood. These doors were made to withstand attack, and made recently.

Hux is willing to bet this is where Snoke is.

The heavy doors swing outward, towards the corridor, but there are no handles or purchases visible on this side. The strategist in Hux approves of the design - once the doors close, it will take some extreme heavy lifting to open them from outside, and while they might not be impervious to the steel battering rams and laser siege weapons at any modern army’s disposal, their size and thickness would guarantee some time to whomever hides behind them.

Right now, however, they stand slightly ajar, a gap wide enough for him to slip through if he turns slightly sideways, one shoulder scraping lightly against the wood, The chamber on the other side is mostly empty, rotting wooden arches climbing the walls and curving towards the ceiling, which itself is mostly intact, and presumably why Snoke chose this particular room to be his… command post? Throne room?   

Hux is so preoccupied with the chamber as he steps inside that the splash of water surprises him. He backtracks and lifts up his boot incredulously. The entire floor of this chamber is covered in it, mossy green algae rippling on a glassy pool of brown. The smell is fetid; stagnant water mixed with the pungent stench of decaying leaves and wood.

A single window, clear glass set close to the ceiling and mostly whole, lets in a beam of motley light; a spotlight illuminating a perfect pool of light in the center of the floor, flecks of dust dancing in the beam as they tumble their way towards the floor.

in the center of the spotlight, Kylo Ren kneels on both knees in the fetid water, hands clenched at his sides and his head bent in supplication. He’s still in his battle clothes, the water around him tinged black with blood. And before him sits Supreme Leader Snoke himself, a small, old and frail figure perched on a tall chair raised out of the water on some kind of dias.

 

[ lovely art by <http://intervolved-fate.tumblr.com/> ]

 

And if the amount of melodrama in the scene before him isn't already such a normal part of his everyday life, Hux might sigh or roll his eyes, but really, this is the same Supreme Leader who projects a twenty-five-foot hologram of himself when he could just use a comm link like any normal person, so Hux feels unsurprised that he’s made provisions to have his own personal spotlight.

Hux walks (sloshes) up to the Supreme Leader and Kylo Ren, giving Ren a dirty look as he comes to stand beside him, ankle-deep in sludge. As he nears Ren it’s as if he walks into a cloud of his power, the heavy, almost-static air making the hair on his arms rise. The water around Ren is rippling outwards constantly, vibrating with the energy around him as if Ren can barely contain it.

Snoke is watching Hux calmly, appearing unperturbed at the interruption. A steady stream of water is trickling into the chamber somewhere, echoing. Ren doesn’t move, only sparing Hux a sideways glance. Hux can't tell what he's feeling, which is strange, because Hux is usually able to read Ren easier than a children’s book without his mask.

As he turns his gaze to Snoke, Hux finds himself taken aback. He blinks. _This_ is the Supreme Leader? A far cry from his huge, intimidating hologram. Leader Snoke seems ancient, his skin a dull, grey pallor close to death and wrinkled beyond belief. And he’s… decidedly unimposing. In fact, Hux finds himself completely underwhelmed. Huh. Just a tiny old… non-specific life form.

Snoke is looking at him expectantly, and Hux remembers that it’s rude to stare.

“Supreme Leader,” he begins, taking a moment to order his thoughts, “I’ve brought Kylo Ren to you, as you asked.”

“Yes,” Snoke agrees.

They stare at each other for a moment. Hux guesses it’s his turn again.

“If I may, Leader Snoke. What now? We can not let the destruction of Starkiller Base go unpunished. Will you give the order to rally the troops? We need to retaliate as soon as possible.”

“We will do no such thing,” Snoke answers, looking at Hux calmly, “A big enough blow was dealt to the Resistance today.”

No retaliation? He frowns. As a military leader, Hux can imagine very few situations in which a direct assault on enemy territory would go unpunished. Unless Snoke’s strategy is to roll onto his back, belly up, and fake defeat until they can strike with a large enough force, which Hux doubts, since Snoke has not taken any steps towards gathering such a force. He can't figure out where Snoke is going with this.

“The Hosnian system,” Hux assumes, feeling his way through the dark, “was an impressive blow to the Resistance indeed, but that’s exactly the reason why we can’t be seen as…” He trails off as Snoke holds up a hand, signalling for silence.

The Supreme Leader’s gaze slides from Hux to Kylo Ren, pointedly, and realization hits Hux like a kick to the stomach. Not the Hosnian system. Not his Starkiller Base. Not the hundreds of hours he'd spent designing the weapon, making deals and sucking up to its manufacturers, or strategizing its launch.

He physically takes a step backward, whispering, “Han Solo.”

According to Snoke, the biggest defeat suffered by the Resistance was not the loss of the five planets of the Hosnian system, but the loss of one man, a traitor and an insignificant smuggler. Except that there is one person he was certainly not insignificant to at all - General Leia Organa. Snoke is counting on the emotional impact of Solo’s death to weaken Organa, a personal strike at the deepest core of the Resistance.

“You can’t be serious,” Hux spits out before thinking, “You honestly think this will be enough to cripple them?”

“Do not underestimate the emotional vulnerability of humans, General Hux,” Snoke responds archly, “Especially the females. The General is the key to the heart of the enemy. She may be stoic enough to be their warlord, but this will break her. And with her, a crack will tear into the very foundation of the Resistance.”

And so this is Supreme Leader Snoke - an old, frail man who considers the loss of billions of lives a lesser conquest than the death of one man and the consequent emotional harm to one woman.

Hux isn't sure he even has the capacity for speech right now, his mouth working around words that won't come out.

“L-leader Snoke,” he finally manages, “She may be their General, but she is only one woman. I do not think it wise to rest on our laurels right after--”

Snoke gestures sharply and Hux quiets automatically, a soldier’s reflex response to authority.

“I do not need you to think anything, General. And I certainly did not invite you to question my methods. We will not retaliate the attack on Starkiller Base. This is final.” He waves at Hux dismissively, “Leave us now.”

Hux stares at him, disbelief warring with a deep, burning rage like a physical fire in his chest. Next to him he can feel Ren’s eyes on him, maybe trying to tell him something, but Hux only has eyes for Snoke.

He stares at this shell of a man he once held in the highest esteem, and can almost physically feel his respect for the Supreme Leader crumbling into a sort of disappointed contempt. He’s been dismissed, so he inclines his head curtly, turns on his heel and stalks out the chamber. He barely even registers the water dripping from the ceiling, saturating his half-dried clothes again, and before he knows it he’s left the Citadel entirely, stepping outside into the marginally more breathable air. It's possible one of the Stormtroopers tries to speak to him as he stalks past, but he ignores him, his anger driving him up to the broad trunk of an enormous tree close to the pathway.

Before he realizes what he's doing he’s slammed his fist into the tree, once, twice, five times in quick succession with a vicious snarl, sending leaves cascading down around him. He punches the tree as hard as he can until, with one particularly brutal punch, he feels a sharp, painful crack across his fingers. Something inside him stills with the pain, some abstract need for violence fulfilled, the well of his anger spent and dry. He's breathing hard. Out of the corner of his eye he can see the Stormtroopers at the Citadel staring at him.

 _Calm yourself_ , he thinks at himself sternly, _you would scorn this kind of behavior in Kylo Ren._

General Hux does not throw tantrums. His anger is cold, calculated, and more often than not, cruel. Not wild and passionate, not like Ren. He sucks in a deep breath, bowing his head and gingerly pressing the palm of his uninjured hand to his aching knuckles. Take stock. Find composure. Regain control of the situation. (Regain control of yourself).

He's angry, yes. Angry and insulted by Snoke’s casual dismissal of the destruction of his life's work. And that’s the crux of it: Hux’s ego took a blow, and now he's taking it out on a tree. He’s letting his conceit win over common sense; unprofessional and immature (if highly satisfying). He can't allow his feelings on the matter to interfere with the goals of the First Order, no matter how personal it gets for him. The Supreme Leader has a strategy, a reason for his actions. Hux needs to take a step back and look at the bigger picture, remove his ego from the equation and try to understand Snoke’s reasoning.

He’s tired, covered in sweat, his head still pounding, and now he thinks he may have broken his hand on top of demeaning himself in front of some Stormtroopers. This will not do. He needs to rest; needs some time to think.

In the distance, he can still hear the faint roar of the river. It sounds appealing, somewhere far from the ‘troopers (still watching him as if he were a bomb ready to explode at any moment; which, fair enough), and far away from Snoke and his acolyte. Hux has always liked the sound of running water. It’s soothing and uncomplicated, a simple and sure fact of nature, constant motion from one point in the world to another, and if there is one thing Hux can use some of right now, it’s simplicity.

So he steps into the secret path again, its twists and turns much less mysterious on the way back than they were coming. And now that he has the rough locations of the Citadel and the campsite to work off of, he finds it a lot easier to keep track of which direction he’s moving in. The sound of the river shifts with the turning path, so he’s able to more or less pin its general location by the time he reaches the campsite again.

The Knights of Ren are where he left them, huddled in their little clique, a murder of grim reapers hunched over themselves and talking quietly. In the distance, he hopes he is seeing his Stormtroopers work on repairing the shuttle.

One small blessing: it's stopped raining, and the clouds are starting to part enough to allow a small peak of blue sky, starting to tinge towards orange as the day progresses.

Now that Hux knows what to look for, he can almost immediately spot several other openings in the trees leading away from the camp, mysterious paths to unfathomable locations. He only needs one. He chooses a path leading roughly East.

Since he has only the sound of the river to go on, and because there are fucking vines everywhere, he finds himself having to backtrack along the trail once or twice, pushing branches aside and all but clambering over the large, mossy roots thrusting up out of the earth to forge a way forward. The path he's on now is refreshingly light, thick pools of warm orange and yellow spreading over the leaves and undergrowth. Strangely, it has none of the dark mystery of the path leading to the Citadel, no time-distorting characteristics and, happiest of all, no Leader Snoke waiting on the other side.  

Eventually the roar of the river overwhelms all the sounds of the jungle, and he exits the treeline onto a wide riverbank, littered with almost perfectly round, grey pebbles and flotsam. The water stretches to both sides as far as the eye can see, curving into a lazy bend towards the East, and it’s wide, very wide. The opposite bank is lost in the distance underneath a thick, white fog. It’s loud, up close, but Hux finds himself glad to be rid of the sounds of birds and insects for a brief respite, no matter how short.

The sun is just starting to set over the jungle, the two moons they’d seen from orbit hanging low and fat in the sky, hazy through the last remaining clouds. The light tinges everything orange, glittering in the small waves and ripples of the river.

Casting around, he spots a fallen log near the treeline a few meters away. The pebbles would make for unsteady walking by themselves, but they’re also wet from their proximity to the river, slippery as well as uneven, and Hux’s body is completely tensed up with the effort not to fall on his ass by the time he makes it over to slump down on the fallen branch.

It’s just about the most uncomfortable seat he’s ever had the displeasure of sitting on, but it will do. He rolls his tired shoulders. Sweat runs in streams down his back, making his uniform shirt cling uncomfortably.

Hux is the kind of man who wouldn’t be caught dead out of uniform, especially in potentially hostile territory, but he’s had a really bad day, and there’s no one around, and he decides that he won’t be much use to the First Order if he dies of heat stroke anyway.

So he takes off his belt and overcoat, using mostly his right hand, as the left is still throbbing. The coat goes in a neat square on the log next to him, the belt in a coil on top of it. He feels markedly better in only his uniform’s dress shirt and jodhpurs, and because he's already come this far, he also undoes the top buttons of his shirt and rolls up the sleeves to just under his elbows, because why the fuck not. (He leaves his hat on, because a General is not a General without his hat).

Next, the glove comes off his left hand, finger by careful finger. It looks about as bad as it feels, red and swollen, the knuckles bloodied and bruised even under the protective leather of the glove. But not broken, he decides as he feels each finger carefully, berating himself for his momentary lapse in control that led to this.

He pulls the other glove off with his teeth, laying both carefully on top of the pile.

Finally, he feels like he can breathe. Closing his eyes, he focuses just on inhaling and exhaling and trying to stop sulking. There’ll be plenty of time to feel sorry for himself later, once he’s back on the Finalizer and secure in the knowledge that the holy fire of revenge will soon rain down on Resistance heads.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's honestly so great to see a vision you'd had inside of your head come to life this vividly in art. The lighting and colors, broken stone and decrepit walls, everything is exactly like I'd pictured the Citadel to be. Thank you, intervolved-fate!


	4. Things go 0-100 real quick

The pressing heat and soothing sound of running water have soon lulled Hux into a state of almost meditation. Eyes closed, he rolls his neck to get rid of some of the tension there, and when it twinges, the little self-deprecating voice that lives in his head reminds him that, on top of everything else he’s had to go through today, he also got Force-choked by the biggest dick in the galaxy. And got aroused by it. 

He opens his eyes, any semblance of a good mood he may have started to have immediately ruined.

He really needs to think about what he’s going to do about Ren, both from a strategic point of view, and also about his own confounded attraction to the man, which is not only highly inconvenient at the present point in time, but also extremely embarrassing. He hates Ren, he reminds himself. ‘Hates’, not ‘gets turned on by’. Please. He adds Ren to the growing list of concerns he has about the First Order in general.

Resting his elbows on his knees and rubbing the knuckles of his injured hand lightly with his thumb, he stares into the distance across the river.

On the top of that list sits Supreme Leader Snoke and his refusal to order a retaliatory attack on the Resistance. If it were up to Hux there would already be a number of spikes lined up for the mounting of Resistance heads. But it's not up to him, and Snoke seems to think General Organa will take care of the Resistance’s decapitation - at least in a metaphorical sense - for them. Relying on the emotional vulnerability of one woman to rupture the leadership of the enemy, versus sending a legion of gunships armed with laser cannons and Stormtroopers to annihilate them...

No. No matter how he turns it over in his head, Snoke’s strategy just does not seem sound. Whatever reason the Supreme Leader has for bringing Kylo Ren to him at this juncture instead of waging a full-scale war, it has little to do with the ultimate goals of the First Order. Of this Hux is sure. He’s also sure that the last thing Kylo Ren needs is any more training from Snoke.

He can still feel echoes of Ren’s energy like a vice around his throat.  _ There _ was the real power of the First Order. Their Supreme Leader has, as far as Hux can see, relied on manipulation to claw his way to the top of the food chain, enigmatic in presence, captivating, and an expert in finding and exploiting weaknesses to bend people to his will. Hux hasn’t once seen him use the Force until now. Of the two of them, Ren seems to be the one with the only real power. In fact, with the way he’s been having Ren do all his dirty work, Hux is starting to wonder if Snoke has any real power at all.

And it's suddenly so clear to Hux, here on this miserably hot planet, on his log by the glittering river: Snoke needs Kylo Ren. He’s weak without him. With Ren as his war dog, no threat of his is empty. Wielding the name of the First Order like a banner, he’s struck fear into the hearts of both those who follow him and seek to oppose him, rising to the throne as the indisputable ruler of the Order, and by extension, its vast military and financial resources. The Supreme Leader’s hold over both the First Order and its enemies lies entirely in his ability to control Ren. 

And the enormity of the power that gives him by proxy is absolute. A full stop in the ongoing history of the Empire, and now, the First Order.

But Snoke is fragile and decrepit, a weak old man with strange notions and hidden agendas, and Hux will not tolerate even the slightest doubtful action in the name of the Order. Duplicity and deception only lead to corruption, and where there is corruption, chaos will always overwhelm order. 

So. Snoke has to go, then, doesn't he.

Hux sits back, clasping his hands between his knees and chewing at his lip, overwhelmed by the enormity of what he is considering. 

Get rid of Snoke…? 

_ The fuck are you thinking?  _ He squeezes his eyes shut. The First Order is everything to Hux. The mere act of thinking about treason like this twists in his gut like a poison. The Supreme Leader is the absolute highest authority, and it grates on every militaristic bone in his body to even consider usurping him. But if it were for the good of the First Order in the first place, might not even treason be considered an admissible crime?

…Get rid of Snoke. 

The more he thinks about it, the more it starts to seem like the only clear solution to the problem at hand, and Hux can almost begin convincing himself that it actually sounds like a good idea, and not just the potential to completely derail whatever’s left of his military career. 

Persuading Kylo Ren of this, though, is bound to be slightly more difficult. Hux kind of peripherally knows about the Jedi and their beliefs, of course - mandatory lessons in his school days - but he doesn't think the Jedi traditionally get quite as… zealous as Ren does about the Force. It's much more than a religion to him; it shapes his every thought and action and lies at the base of each and every desire. And this was a gap that Snoke stepped right into, as Hux understands it, when Ren was just young enough to allow himself to be led very far down that particular rabbit hole.

Hux remembers going to church back on his old planet when he was young, and the expression on Ren’s face when he looks at the Supreme Leader is not unlike that of the worshippers as they sang their prayers.  In fact, there might only be one thing Ren believes in more passionately than the Supreme Leader: Darth Vader. Already no more than a phantom. Hux can’t imagine the consequences of taking Snoke from Ren, too. 

Images flash before Hux’s eyes of Ren pulling the very thoughts from men’s minds, razing entire small villages by himself. Ren is more powerful than Vader and Snoke combined, but he's blind to this, or maybe Snoke has blinded him to it.

Hux suddenly becomes aware of the sound of soft footsteps crunching over the pebbles towards him. Annoying. How did anyone find him here? And of course it has to be Kylo Ren, as if Hux thinking about him summoned him here (which, actually, possibly it did, but probably it was the man’s infuriating knack of somehow always finding a way to interrupt him at exactly the worst time, a talent he’s perfected during their time together on the Finalizer).

Ren comes to a standstill next to Hux’s log. He looks like he's cleaned himself up, Hux thinks jealously, yearning for the hot spray of a shower. Ren's changed into a baggy, black shirt and loose breeches tucked into his usual boots, the ugly lightsaber burn on his face cleaned of blood and dirt to leave an angry red welt over his neck and face. His right arm is in a sling. 

The wind picks up, hissing through the trees and mingling with the sound of the river, and though there were blue skies just a moment before, clouds start to roll in again from the West, entirely too fast for Hux’s liking.

Eventually he grows tired of Ren just standing there, looking at him creepily, so he turns his head up to him and says “All done grovelling before the Supreme Leader, then?” at the exact same time as Ren says “Shouldn’t you be back on the Finalizer?”

For a long moment they just glare at each other before Ren scowls and sits down next to Hux with a huff, a bit closer than Hux would have liked, to avoid sitting on his folded clothes.  He holds out a canteen of water and a small ration packet, both clasped in one of his big hands, and on seeing these Hux is suddenly reminded how desperate he’s been for a drink, his stomach chiming in with a growl.

Despite the tiny voice in Hux's head telling him he'd almost rather die than accept help from Kylo Ren, of all people, the bigger voice of survival tells him to shut up and take it.

He’s too dignified to grab both from him, but does take them quickly, twisting open the canteen and draining almost half of it in long, desperate gulps before pulling away to pant for breath. The cool water sliding down his throat feels better than anything he can remember. 

Ren is watching him, silently, perhaps expecting a thank you. Hux won't. He thinks about shoving him off the log out of spite, but he's too busy trying to work the ration bar out of its packaging. It’s some kind of dry, coconutty biscuit, dotted with something resembling chocolate chips, too sweet for Hux’s taste, but adequate in sating his most immediate hunger pangs.

The bar is gone too soon, the last water from the canteen dripping like honey onto his tongue.

The silence stretches between them, broken only by the sound of Hux crumpling the plastic packaging of the ration bar and dropping it to the ground. Taunting Kylo Ren has always been something of a hobby of his. Now that they are both here by the glistening sunset water and Ren brought him food, he finds himself unsure of what to say to him for the first time in their shared history. He isn't even sure he knows how to speak to the man without a certain amount of disdain.

And sitting here, Ren’s body heat like a hot brand where their thighs align, Ren’s presence is all around him somehow, like it never was before on the Finalizer. Hux feels like he’s sitting in a cloud of him, suffocating in a completely different way to the humid air of the planet. It’s disconcerting, feeling Ren pushing against him like this in the awkward silence, so he says the first thing that comes to mind, swallowing the last of the rations and fixing Ren with a sideways glance.

“You look like hell.”

Ren tilts his head slightly in that way he has, something like a noncommittal shrug, and doesn’t skip a beat. “At least my wounds aren't self-inflicted.” He nods at Hux’s bruised hand, which Hux pulls away a fraction too late, lowering it beside his thigh. 

Hux scowls. Of course he’d know Hux did this to himself. Kylo fucking Ren and his fucking tea-leaf reading nonsense; most powerful telepath in the universe, and the only thing he ever uses it for is getting on Hux’s nerves. Hux expects further taunting, but Ren is quiet again, staring out over the river. 

And so this is the man he needs to convince to help him kill Snoke. A man who, even without the mask and with eyes more expressive than any Hux has seen before, remains indecipherable to him, filled with rage and despair and too hostile to even attempt familiarity. The wounds Ren suffered on Starkiller Base were enough to kill a normal man three times over, and yet here he is, bringing Hux food and water for some absurd reason Hux can’t even begin to fathom.

He wants to ask why. Instead, he turns to him with a frown and asks, “How did you even find me?” 

Ren kind of shrugs with his good shoulder, and just says, “The Force.”

They lapse into silence again. In the jungle somewhere, a bird Hux pictures as fat and ugly lets out a particularly loud warble. Ren turns his head towards the trees, perhaps trying to spot it. He’s leaned back on his hands on the log, and doesn’t look like he’s going anywhere. Hux isn’t really sure what he thinks he’s doing here. But he doesn’t seem to be about to leave him in peace, so Hux figures, now’s as good a time as any to test the waters. If he can survive proposing the idea of killing Snoke to Ren, he might actually stand a chance of succeeding in this insane endeavour.

He considers his words for a moment, deciding on his angle, then says, “I was serious, you know.”

Ren turns his head towards him, eyes boring into the side of his face. Hux keeps his gaze carefully on the river, and elaborates, “About you not being a worthy successor to Vader.” 

Ren  _ bristles _ and Hux feels the hair on the back of his neck stand up, so he hurriedly adds, “Not while you grovel under Snoke.” 

There’s a pause while Ren glares at him. “Explain.”

“You don’t need him.” He says simply. “Your power is… So much bigger than his employment of you. He’s weak, Ren, and exploiting you to compensate for it. And for what? Military conquest? The promotion of law and organization of an anarchic galaxy? No. A few documents signed, some mining outposts overthrown. In fact,” he realizes as he speaks, “the biggest onslaught in the history of the First Order was the attack on the Hosnian System, and that was all my idea. The Supreme Leader is nothing but a symbol. A figurehead. But you...” 

Hux can feel Ren’s anger billow out over him physically, like holding your hand too close to boiling water, tiny hot pinpricks of energy spattering against his skin. He fights the urge to pull away from him, carefully keeping his eyes down, and presses on. “You could kill him. Easily, I’d bet.”

At this, Ren huffs, his power subsiding abruptly. He lifts his hand to rub at his injured shoulder. “You’re crazy.”

Hux feels safe looking at him, so he turns towards him slightly. “ _ I’m _ crazy? I’m not the one Snoke fooled into killing his own father.”   


Ren turns his head away, closing his eyes.

“What did he tell you?” Hux continues, “That killing Han Solo would strengthen you in the Dark Side of the Force?” He drawls each word out sarcastically. Ren makes an annoyed face. 

“Han Solo was also the husband of the leader of the Resistance,” Hux says. “Snoke played on your emotions and fed you some bullshit about this mystical power you're so desperate to believe in, but at the same time he also happened to deal a massive personal blow against his greatest enemy. Don’t you find that a bit of a coincidence?”

Ren makes a kind of frustrated exhale, turning to Hux. “Where is this coming from? What does it matter if it served his own ends? Results are results.”

It’s started getting colder around them again, Ren’s emotions leaking over Hux as he starts getting riled up.

“Ren, think about it. It’s strategy. Snoke furthered his own political agenda by feeding you lies. And did it strengthen you, like he said it would?”

Ren rises to his feet, snarling and raising a hand, and Hux starts to feel the press of the Force bearing down on him, but this time he's prepared and doesn’t even think twice before surging up and sharply backhanding him right over the burn on his face. Ren is so surprised his power flickers out abruptly. He stares at Hux open-mouthed, lifting his left hand to press against his cheek.

“The Supreme Leader is using you,” Hux stresses, his eyes tracing Ren’s face for signs of another outburst. Ren has simmered down into a dark glower, hand clenched at his side. He steps up very close to Hux, leaning right in.

"Careful,  _ General _ ,” he all but hisses in his face, “that's the last thing Han Solo said to me before I plunged my saber through his heart." It comes out as a sort of whispered growl. It’s freezing around them, the air shimmering with Ren’s power.

Hux can’t back down now. “Just for a moment, Ren. Take a step back and look at the bigger picture.  If Leader Snoke is so strong with the Force, why are you the one doing his dirty work? Killing off Jedi or whatever it is you do.”

“The Supreme Leader trusts me,” Ren counters, “I am his eyes in the deep reaches, his hand plunged through the heart of his enemies. If I do his work it’s because he has found me worthy of doing so.”

Hux mutters, “Or maybe it’s a sign of impotence.”

“Leader Snoke has his reasons,” is all Ren says, loquacious as usual.

Hux’s lip curls. “Of that, there is no question. But I doubt he’s shared any of those with us.” He shakes his head, crossing his arms. “I don’t think he’s as infallible as you’ve made him out to be, Ren.” 

"Come on Hux,” Ren says softly, and Hux is surprised by the sudden heat in his voice. Those warm eyes flash with fervor. “Haven't you ever wanted to believe in something bigger than yourself? Leader Snoke has done nothing if not in the name of the First Order. You want to establish him as some kind of puppet just because you can’t see physical evidence of his power. But it’s there, Hux. I’ve felt it.”

Hux almost falters under the heat of Ren’s gaze, uncrossing his arms slowly, not quite sure if he’ll have to defend himself physically. “Because you wanted to. Needed to.”

“Your scepticism blinds you. How can you go through life with the sincere conviction that you are the most powerful thing in it?"

Their faces are inches apart, close enough that he can feel Ren’s breath, and still surrounded by the icy cold of his power.

“ Belief in something bigger than yourself is all very well and good, Ren, but putting all your faith and your power behind a false idol is meaningless.  You're not seeing the bigger picture.” Hux stares right into those eyes, trying to somehow push the vision of his own rise to power alongside Ren right into his mind. Get rid of Snoke. Take control of the Order. And in Snoke’s place, a new Supreme Leader...

He doesn't know if it works, or if Ren arrives at the conclusion himself, but he suddenly looks at Hux with dawning apprehension, taking half a step back. “... Me?”

Hux grabs him by the front of his shirt with both hands, pulling him closer. "Listen to me, Ren. Snoke is nothing. A figurehead. But you… god, Ren, you could tear down whole galaxies with your power. Don’t you see what you could do without him holding you back?"

Ren is staring at him, wide-eyed, and for the first time Hux wishes he was the one with the mind-reading powers, because Ren is either about to punch him or kiss him, and -

Oh. Not the punching thing, apparently.

It’s rough and surprisingly passionate, Ren’s mouth too warm and his body hard against Hux. His hands are all over him despite the slinged arm trapped between them (how is it possible for him to be  _ everywhere _ ?) and Hux feels his power around him like a shroud, filling his ears and his lungs, slowly changing from icy cold to a mellow, comfortable haze surrounding them both.

Hux hears himself make a small, surprised sound into Ren’s mouth, his eyes going from stretched wide open to sliding shut slowly because he did not expect kissing Kylo Ren to feel this  _ good _ . His hands slip up to clutch two fistfuls of Ren’s hair, trying to pull him closer. Ren’s walking them backwards, holding Hux steady around his waist, till the backs of Hux’s calves hit the log. Ren’s hand skims up to the back of his neck, tumbling his hat to the ground. The sound of it thudding onto the pebbles is enough to pull Hux back into reality.

He pulls away from Ren with some effort, pushing him back and holding him at arm’s length with both hands. “Stop it. Stop.”

Ren looks at him with a small frown, silent.

Hux catches his breath, mad that he can feel his cheeks burning. There is no way in hell he was just  _ kissing _ Kylo Ren. He refuses to accept it. It was the Force. Ren used it to manipulate him. “Just what in the name of the Old Empire do you think you’re doing?”

“Me?” Ren clenches his uninjured fist at his side, the frown turning into a glower. “You started this.”

“You kissed me.” Hux says, indignantly. “Not the other way around.”

“You wanted me to.” Ren says, as if that explains everything. “And I wanted to, too.”

“I most certainly did not! This is just another of your mind games. You’re sad and lonely and thought--”

The rest of Hux’s sentence is cut off in an indignant grunt as Ren hooks one arm around him and lifts him, bodily (Hux doesn’t think he used the Force and god, just how strong is he, anyway?). He rests his hands on Ren’s shoulders, looking down at him with a murderous glare.

“If you don’t---”

“Shut up.” says Ren, and leans up to kiss him again. And god fucking damn if Hux doesn’t like it, to his eternal and soul-crushing shame. And okay. Maybe he has wanted this, just a bit, ever since feeling Ren’s power around his throat on the shuttle. And anyway, he reasons, his entire day has already been so fucking surreal he might as well do this, here, with Kylo Ren of all people. It feels good. For now, that’s enough.

Ren is still holding him up with just one arm, like the fucking showoff he is. They must have turned around, because Hux feels himself sinking with Ren onto the log. He straddles his thighs and takes his face in both hands, all but trying to somehow physically climb into his mouth. 

But then he feels  Ren start fumbling down the front of his pants. Kissing is one thing. He can accept kissing, on a kind of abstract  _ I had a shit day and made some bad life choices _ level, but this? This is something else entirely. Hux’s hands slip down to scrabble at Ren’s hand, trying to pull it away and thinking “ _ too fast, this is too fast” _ , but Ren pulls away from their kiss with a lopsided smile and just says, “No such thing.” 

Hux frowns at him, breathing hard. “I'll thank you to stay out of my hea- aah---”

Ren’s huge palm, slowly rubbing up and down Hux's cock, makes him lose his train of thought and the rest of his sentence. Electricity rolls in a tingling wave over his entire body. He bites his lip hard to keep from making any other sounds, his fingers digging into Ren’s biceps as he feels himself getting hard instantly under his touch. Ren’s face is tilted down to look at his hand, his hair hiding his eyes.

“Fuck you,” Hux manages to bite out, “Not fair.”

Ren blinks up at him. “Since when do we play fair, General?”

He takes advantage of Hux’s distraction to tug down his jodhpurs and underwear, hefting him up by the waist so he can push them down to his ankles.

The jodhpurs bundle around his boots, binding his ankles together and forcing him to spread his knees uncomfortably wide around Ren’s thighs. Ren’s hand is back on his cock, big enough to close around it entirely and when he squeezes, Hux thinks he may actually black out. 

Okay. Apparently this is happening. Really happening. He’s about to fuck Kylo Ren in the fucking wilderness on some fucking log next to a river. He clutches onto Ren’s arm, his back bent at an awkward angle, feeling entirely out of control of the situation.

But then Ren’s mouth is on his again, sloppy and lewd, and he decides Ren can do whatever he wants to him - has the ability to, and Hux’s permission - as long as he keeps kissing him like this. He feels rather than hears Ren murmur into his mouth, “I’ve been waiting to do this for a long time.”

“You…?” Hux blinks, “What?” He tries to pull away to look at him, but Ren’s turned his face down again, spitting into his hand, a long trail of saliva dripping from his bottom lip and fuck, that’s hot. Hux thinks he might come right there, and bites the inside of his cheek hard enough to taste the slight tang of blood, using the pain as a distraction from potential embarrassment. 

He glances down and, oh, shouldn’t have done that, because Ren’s pants have come down around his thighs at some point, his cock out and hard, and it is huge, leaking and red. Hux stares, transfixed, because this is much more of Kylo Ren than Hux had ever planned on seeing and all he can think is, this is a really bad decision. This will only end in tears. (At this point, he’s not sure whose: he wants to say Ren’s, when Hux inevitably beats the shit out of him for causing this entire catastrophe, but to be honest, Hux may just join him, and wouldn’t that just be the most romantic way to end a sexual interlude in the history of the galaxy; two blubbering fools weeping in each other’s arms.)

But Ren is fisting himself, smearing a trail of spit up and down his cock, his mouth on Hux’s neck and Hux has to resign himself to the fact that, whatever the outcome may be, he wants this. He doesn’t know why or how this happened, but he finds that he wants it, to hell with the consequences; he wants Ren’s lips sucking obscene kisses onto his neck, and he definitely wants him inside of him, preferably sooner rather than later.

Something presses against him from behind, making him squirm. It’s definitely not Ren’s hands, one still immobile in the sling and the other currently occupied with his own cock. But something is fingering at Hux, pressing slowly inside and no. There is no fucking way he is letting the Force anywhere near his sex life. He beats at Ren’s shoulder with the side of his fist.    
“Get that away from me.”

“Hmm,” Ren murmurs against his neck, “you’d rather take me unprepared?”

“If it’s a choice between taking you dry or having you use the Force like some kind of obscene invisible finger, I’d rather you keep your magic bullshit away from my assh---”

Ren silences him with another kiss, and Hux might not have a very high opinion of whatever other talents the man may have, but fuck, he kisses like he’s  _ dying _ , like this is the very last thing he’ll ever get to do, and Hux can’t help but get drawn into how incredibly good it feels.

Ren does accede to his request, though. The ghostly touch of the Force is replaced by the very real, very wide girth of Ren’s cock, nudging into him entirely too fast and  _ wow _ , that hurts. He guesses he asked for it. But. Still fucking hurts.

Hux scrabbles for something against the pain, hissing, and finds the thicker patch of material on Ren’s side where bandages have been piled onto the bowcaster wound. He digs his fingers in like a claw, grabbing onto it as hard as he can, and when it doesn't seem to stop Ren, he beats his fist on top of it, hard. 

Ren grunts against the side of Hux’s face, shoving up, and suddenly Hux finds himself seated fully in his lap, preparation or no, his ass scraping against the coarse hairs of Ren’s crotch. He feels like he might tear open from the inside, filled to bursting, and it hurts like nothing he’s felt before. But the pain, too, is so very part of what Kylo Ren  _ is _ . Hux really doesn’t know why he imagined it would be anything else. 

He gulps down deep breaths, trying to will his body to adjust. He needs to see more of Ren, to feel more of him, needs the tactile sense of him under his hands to distract him from the pain. He pulls away, managing to tear Ren’s shirt over his head, the sling catching on his shoulder and requiring several tugs to get loose. Eventually his chest is revealed, too pale, dotted with imperfections and torn, red and angry, over his shoulder. The bandage on his side is stained with blood; Hux’s doing.

Ren is just looking at Hux quietly, not moving, and Hux finds himself unable to look away, caught in those soft eyes of his. It makes him uncomfortable, like Ren is looking right into his mind, this connection somehow almost more intimate than the one their bodies share. 

Ren is completely still inside of him, his power all around Hux and inside him, holding every inch of him completely. He feels like all Ren needs to do is  _ squeeze _ and he’ll explode into pulp. Hux can't move or breathe, caught in the haze of Ren’s energy. And he feels like he will absolutely lose his mind if Ren doesn’t move, doesn’t do something except stare at him. He allows his eyes to flick between Ren’s, wondering if he can feel his frustration.

When Ren doesn’t respond in any way, Hux grabs a fistful of his hair, twisting his fingers in it and wrenching Ren closer for another kiss (anything to get away from those eyes). 

“Would you,” he manages to gasp between kisses, “would you just. Move, would you just,  _ do _ something.”    
  
Ren makes a soft sound into his mouth; Hux can feel it in the back of his throat. “Sorry,” he mumbles, pulling away from Hux a little, “You’re just so…” he trails off, tilting his head slightly as he pulls away to look at him properly.

“I’m so  _ what _ , Ren? God, just…”

“...Narrow.” Ren finishes.

Hux stares at him incredulously. “...Narrow?” Fuck if that isn’t the least romantic thing anyone’s ever said to him during sex.

“Coat makes you look bigger, I guess.”

Hux is about to make a snide remark, but Ren hooks his arm around Hux’s waist and slides forward off the log, still inside of him, sinking onto his knees before lowering Hux to the pebbled ground. He supports himself on his good arm, the other resting at an angle over Hux’s chest. The rocks dig into Hux’s back painfully, scraping and jutting through his shirt right into his spine. Ren shifts, shoving his cock deeper into him and Hux cries out, his back arching up against the pain as Ren starts a rhythm thrusting into him. 

Hux is right on his pain threshold, Ren’s cock too big and the rocks under his back too hard, but god, he never thought anything could feel this good. Ren’s cock burns where it slides in and out of him, the hard planes of his stomach trapping Hux’s cock between them with delicious pressure. He arches up against him, his head falling back, and when Ren pulls out and shoves back in, Hux’s fingers find the wound on his face, nails digging into the angry welt and dragging long trails of blood over his cheek.

Ren cries out, grabbing Hux’s wrist with his other hand and slamming it onto the pebbles next to his head, pinning it down with as much weight as he can put on his injured shoulder. He opens his eyes to glare down at Hux and it’s as if Hux is caught in a tractor beam again, the world seeming to grow dark around them and disappear until his eyes are all Hux can see, the obscene slapping where there bodies meet all he can hear.

And in here, in the sweltering dark, all of Kylo’s vast attention is focused solely on Hux, consuming and all too intense. Hux feels like he is being swallowed by it, like his sense of self is starting to slowly unravel like string and disappear right into Kylo’s mind. It’s terrifying. It’s also something Hux finds he wants more desperately than he’s wanted anything before.

He feels raw and exposed, small, and his orgasm takes him by surprise, the pleasure of it ripping almost violently out of him with a shout. He manages to wrench one hand away from Kylo’s grip and reach down just in time to catch most of it, absurdly worried about staining his black uniform shirt.

It doesn’t take long for Kylo to come after that, closing his eyes with a stuttering groan as warmth floods Hux, leaking out of him between their bodies. As their connection breaks the world starts slowly bleeding back into existence, colours unblurring into shapes, vague outlines solidifying into trees and vines and - 

And the smooth, round pebbles of the riverbank, thousands of them, not littering the ground haphazardly but hovering in the air, perfectly still and glistening in the last light of day. The air thrums around them with Kylo’s power. Hux stares at the pebbles in wonder and apprehension, because  Kylo Ren is not  _ this _ . Kylo is violence and destruction and chaos. Not glistening pebbles hovering peacefully under a beautiful sunset.

Hux feels like he is standing on the very edge of a deep precipice, its floor lost in unimaginable dark. Teetering.

Kylo is bent over Hux, chest heaving. All Hux can see of him is his spine, curving out in tiny bumps, and the ridges of ribs in his side.

Hux clutches him to himself tightly, all of his muscles straining with the effort of bearing his weight, but he isn’t quite ready to let go yet. He doesn’t even know what he’s feeling right now, except that he has to hold on to him as tightly as he can manage and not let go.

He doesn’t know how long they stay like that, Hux’s mind all but blank and his arms aching. The pebbles hover in the air like so many crystal beads, held in perfect stasis. Kylo’s managed to slow his breathing, and abruptly he seems to have had enough of Hux, squirming until his cock slides out of him with a surge of liquid. He tugs against Hux’s grip, pushing back against him. When Hux doesn’t let go, he uses the Force to wrench open his arms, pressing his back to the ground so Kylo can sit up. Pebbles rain to the ground, knocking and skittering back into place with a clatter. 

Four lines of blood echo the path of Hux’s fingers over Kylo’s face, curling from the lightsaber burn over his cheek and blurring into smears around the corner of his mouth where he’d been kissing Hux’s neck. Hux is fascinated by this; finds himself with the ludicrous urge to lean up and lick the blood from his skin. 

Kylo crawls away from him and sits back against the log, head tilted back to expose his neck and eyes closed, left arm resting on one raised knee, the injured right cradled in his lap. He looks positively debauched, his pants still open and his cock out, soft and smeared with dried come, and the bandages on his side saturated through.

Hux leans up on his elbows, casting around for something to say, but the river fills the gaps between his breaths and makes him forget anything that comes to mind, so he steels himself against the pain and sits up, pulling his underwear and jodhpurs up around his hips. He tries his best to ignore the way Kylo’s come seeps into his briefs.

Hux does not fully understand the linear progression of how they got here. All he knows is that his own absolutely staggering lack of self control may have had something to do with it. And here they are: Hux with a handful of brand new emotions he doesn’t even know how to name, much less what to do with, and Kylo fucking Ren, of all the bad decisions Hux could have made, sitting there with his legs splayed open like Hux’s very own personal annihilation. Isn’t this just a happy little clusterfuck of a disaster. 

Hux runs a hand through his hair, sweat and humidity making it clump. It’s disheveled and starting to curl slightly at the ends. He hates it.

He swallows a sigh, daring to sneak a glance at Kylo, who hasn’t moved. 

As if he feels Hux’s eyes on him, he opens his mouth to say, “You want me to become the Supreme Leader.”

Hux’s mouth snaps shut on whatever he was about to say. This isn’t the topic he thinks they should be discussing right now, what with the pretty huge fucking elephant in the room, but he doesn’t know how to breach that particular subject with Kylo just yet, so he hesitates only a little before inclining his head. He realizes Kylo’s eyes are still closed, and says, “Yes.”

“I don't want to rule anyone,” Kylo says softly, “I'm not interested in politics. I want to find Luke Skywalker and kill him.”

“And then what? Kill Skywalker, become the last remaining Jedi?” Hux answers, slowly getting to his feet and fighting the urge to wince as his body protests, his thighs aching with the effort of getting up. The leather straps of his blaster holster slide up lopsidedly, digging into his leg. Kylo’s opened his mouth to say something annoying about not being a Jedi, so Hux talks over him. “You honestly think Snoke would ever allow you to reach your full potential?” He walks slowly over to the log, rebuttoning his jodhpurs, and sits down next to Kylo gingerly, a bit closer than he’d intended, pressing right against his side. 

Kylo opens his eyes, turning his head to look at Hux, and Hux again has the urge to lick the blood from his face; finds himself almost leaning toward him with it, staring at the smears of dark red. He has to swallow before he can continue.

“Snoke has a lot to say about the Force and its role in the First Order, but he has you killing off all the Jedi you can find. He's scared of them, scared of you. Scared of what you might do if you realized your own power. What happens when you’re the last one left standing?”

Kylo is staring at him with that intensity again, and Hux has to fight the urge to look away from it. Eventually Kylo is the first to break the stare, turning to look out over the river.

“You think he’ll get rid of me, too. Wipe any last traces of the Force from the world. But… You’re assuming he’s strong enough to kill me,” he says.

Hux’s lips twitch into a half-smile. He feels an enormous sense of inevitability, standing right on the edge of the start of everything. This small acquiescence from Kylo feels as huge and unstoppable as the collapse of a star. 

“Kill Skywalker, if you must,” Hux says, “Take whatever power you can gain from that. Let it consume you. Let it into your very veins. And then, unleash all of that power onto the universe. Together we can accomplish what Snoke never could in a million years.”

He thinks his voice is too heated, too passionate, but Kylo’s eyes are still on the river, and he sounds unmoved as he replies, “You just want to control me, too. Kylo Ren as your obedient attack dog, and you, conveniently, the next President of the Universe or whatever title you plan to take. That makes you no different than Snoke.” 

Hux snorts, “You can't deny I'd make an excellent President of the Universe.” Then he becomes serious. “Snoke  _ is _ controlling you, Kylo. There’s no denying that. Your idealistic hero worship of Vader? Is controlling you. You can't function without some sort of guidance; you'd be a total disaster.” He holds up his hands in a gesture of surrender when he feels, more than sees, Kylo frown. “But I want the First Order to succeed, more than anything. The galaxy is in chaos. The New Republic is a corrupt cesspool, filled with ego-driven politicians who only seek to enrich themselves, at the cost of everyone beneath them. 

“People are suffering, but there could be law, and peace under the First Order, if it were only in the right hands. And if I’m to be honest, I don’t think I can achieve that without you realizing your full power. Which is, conveniently, what you want, also. But Snoke doesn’t want that, can’t you see? He doesn’t care about equality, about creating a galaxy where every species can exist in consonance. Everything he’s done has only been for his own personal gain. He’ll be the ruin of us all.”

Kylo shifts, dislodging Hux from his side and getting up to toe off his boots before shoving his pants down and kicking them aside. He cradles his injured arm against his chest, turning back to Hux and leaning over to poke him in the chest. “That's treason.” 

Any reply Hux could make gets lost, words flying out the window at the sight of Kylo’s fucking ridiculous cock, hanging limp between his legs. Kylo turns and makes his way slowly over the pebbles towards the river, peeling off the bloody bandages on his side and tossing them aside before stepping into the water.

And as his pale skin disappears into the rippling grey-brown, Hux groans and squeezes his eyes shut. Because. He is in  _ so _ much trouble.


	5. Dumpster diving with your guide, Captain Phasma

Hux smashes his face into his palms with a frustrated growl, scrubbing his cheeks angrily. Kylo’s still hip-deep in the river, his ribs carving ridges into his sides that rise and fall as he bends to scoop water onto his face. Hux’s handblaster digs into his thigh uncomfortably and for a moment, one very brief moment, he considers just shooting himself and ending it. Maybe Kylo, too, for good measure. The glorious murder-suicide of the two biggest fools in the First Order, to bring an end once and for all to the worst fucking day in the history of the universe, to hell with bringing order to the galaxy.

It’s tempting. He sighs deeply, lowering his hands to his knees. Tempting, but not a worthy fate for a General. There are plans to be made, a certain Supreme Leader to overthrow. (He’ll keep murder-suicide as an option in case things don’t work out.)

Right now, he’s sweaty and tired and has Kylo Ren’s come drying in sticky streaks on his thighs, and he’s had quite enough of all this unhygienic business. The river beckons him, luring him with the promise of at least washing away the physical evidence of what he’s sure he will later think of as the worst mistake he’s ever made. 

So he tugs off his boots one by one, lining them up neatly against the log, undoes the holster and slides down his jodhpurs and folds both on top of his cloak, then unbuttons his shirt and shrugs out of it. His undershirt goes over his head, joining the heap of neatly folded uniform bits, leaving him only in his dogtags and briefs. The underwear goes into a small pile on the ground before he gingerly makes his way over the pebbles to the river.

The water is like ice. It surprises Hux, having stepped in too quickly, and he gasps a little before he can stop himself, goosebumps racing over his arms.

Kylo glances at him as he wades in beside him, waist-deep, but doesn’t say anything. Hux lets the water surge around him, closing his eyes in relief as it cleans the sweat and come and shame (some of it, anyway) from his skin. He allows himself to sink down until the water closes around his neck, the cold press of it soothing the still-aching bruises ringing his throat, then rises up, pressing two handfuls to his face and letting it cascade down his cheeks and neck. 

Kylo is like a rock in the water, unmoving, blood seeping from the wound in his side and tinging the water red. He has both hands down to the wrist in the river, fingers splayed open to feel the swirling current.

Hux doesn’t know what to say to him.

“We should talk about---” he starts, but Kylo interrupts him.

“‘Kylo’.” 

“What?”

“You called me ‘Kylo’, back there. It was always ‘Ren’, before.”

“Not always,” Hux retorts, finding himself edging back onto familiar ground. Taunting Kylo Ren, he can do. “Sometimes it was ‘asshole’, ‘lunatic’, or iterations thereof.”

Kylo makes this kind of scrunched up face at him, and Hux looks away, his lips twitching with a very faint smile. “I just had your cock roughly five feet up my ass, Kylo,” he emphasizes the name, “I think that’s pretty good grounds for being on a first name basis.”

Kylo takes a breath, opening his mouth, and Hux just knows what he’s about to ask, so he pre-empts: “Don’t you already know mine? I thought you could read minds, or something like that.”

Kylo’s mouth snaps shut, before he smirks. “You mean your first name isn’t ‘General’?”

He rolls his eyes. “Just ‘Hux’ will do.” 

“Fine, ‘Just Hux’.” Kylo’s eyes are on Hux’s neck, on the bruises he left there himself. The water swirls around them. Hux stares at Kylo’s face quietly, at the smeared blood on his cheek - now just dried streaks of brown - and once again feels the urge to lick it. Because apparently he hasn’t degraded himself quite enough yet today.

“ _ You've convinced yourself you only want what's best for the First Order. _ ” Hux’s eyes snap up to Kylo’s. It’s his voice, but Hux is sure he hasn’t spoken aloud, his voice broadcast right into Hux’s head. And it’s different from his spoken voice somehow: Out loud, Kylo’s words are clipped, rushed, forced out so quickly he often almost stumbles over them. But his mind voice is soft, and slow, and it sends shivers all the way down Hux’s spine, pooling in his lower back. “ _ But going through with this fallacy you’re planning would put you in a position of immense power. Conveniently.  I may be a slave to Snoke, as you so eloquently put it, but you, too, are a slave. To your own illusions of power. At least my gods answer back when I pray to them. _ ”

The precipice shudders beneath Hux and he feels himself starting to fall, swallowed by the deep black as he reaches out, taking Kylo’s face in both of his hands, and stares right into his eyes. “The only thing you need to pray to from now on is me.”

He gives in to the urge and leans in, slowly pressing his tongue to Kylo’s cheek and licking the dried blood off his face, letting his tongue skirt around the edges of the lightsaber wound, not quite dipping into it. Kylo’s face twitches under him, but he doesn't pull away. It tastes as good as he thought it would, he thinks with a sinking feeling. Salty, sharp, unnaturally hot under his tongue. Hux closes his eyes, firmly ignoring the sirens blaring in the back of his head.

They stay this way for a long moment of stasis. Hux has nearly cleaned all the blood off his face when Kylo’s arms lift out of the water quickly, pressing against Hux’s chest and shoving him away roughly. Hux stumbles back, blinking in surprise.

“What was that for?”

“Leave me,” Kylo says simply, lowering his head and turning away from him.

Hux stares at him angrily, his face burning with the rejection. He feels humiliated; confused. 

“Excuse me?”

“Go.” Kylo says dismissively. Hux wonders murderously how long Ren’s precious Force would keep him alive with Hux’s foot smashing his face into the riverbed under the water.

“Listen. I don’t know who you think you are, but you do not get to talk to me like that after we just--”

Kylo snarls, whirling on Hux. He lifts one hand and the river surges up with it, pushing Hux back hard enough to stumble. He has to try and keep his balance, backpedaling as the water threatens to overwhelm him, driving him right up to the shore in a long, rolling wave, and it’s all he can do to just keep his head up and breathe. It washes him up on the pebbles, dropping him neatly on his bum close to the log with his uniform and blaster resting on it.

Kylo’s turned his back on him, facing the opposite shore. Hux lets his gaze shift between his blaster and Kylo’s back a few times as he tries to come up with a good enough reason not to shoot him right there. You need him, he reminds himself, He’ll come in handy later. Probably.

As much as it pains him to follow these particular orders from Kylo Ren, he thinks his anger might actually make him do something stupid if he stays here, so he allows himself just one sneer in Kylo’s general direction before getting up to get dressed. He firmly ignores the splashes of water he can hear behind him as he pulls on his jodhpurs, leaving his come-soaked briefs in a small pile on the pebbles. No power in the universe could convince him to wear those again.

He tugs on his boots one by one, carefully slipping on his overcoat and gloves and smashing his hat on over his disheveled hair. It’s gotten dark, the world turned to hues of twilight blue and purple and the shrill chirrup of a cricket ensemble replacing the warbling twitter of birdsong.

The force of his rage carries him straight back to the clearing, the twisting, winding turns of the path that had so frustrated him on his way here barely registering as he marches back to the shuttle. The unrelenting humid heat of the planet sees to it that he’s perspiring again by the time he steps into the clearing, trickles of sweat tickling down his back and over his temples.

Stormtroopers have set up large, fluorescent lights around the clearing, bathing it in a harsh white light reflecting off the tree trunks and vines. Two of the Knights of Ren have disappeared. Skullface Ren sits hunched over a ration box, looking imposing, while Blaster Ren sprawls on the ground at his feet, resting against his legs. As Hux walks past them, they unanimously stand, turning to stare at him. 

Okay. That’s not creepy at all.

He slows to a stop, folding his hands behind his back and returning the stare, trying not to let on how uneasy he feels. “Can I help you?”

“We were just discussing the ancient legend of Icarus,” Skullface Ren replies, his voice distorted through the mask. He has his thumb hooked into his belt, one hip cocked to the side. “Do you know the story, General?”

“Of course I know the story,” Hux bites back, annoyed. “A silly boy with delusions of grandeur ignores some sound advice and goes up in flames.”

Blaster Ren huffs a soft laugh, shaking her head a little. 

“Accurate,” Skullface Ren concedes, “if somewhat oversimplified. It’s a cautionary tale. Hubris invariably leading to failure. It’s inevitable, General. Pride comes before the fall, and all that.”

Hux stares at him. There’s no way they could know about his thoughts on overthrowing Snoke. No way. He’s certain of this. And yet… the way they are looking at him makes his skin crawl.

“Fascinating,” he drawls with extra vitriol to cover up how uncomfortable they make him feel, “I’m sure the day will come when I might enjoy sitting down with you for a long discussion on the philosophical lessons at the root of even more obscure, ancient stories no one cares about anymore. Today is not that day, however. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” 

He allows his mouth to turn down in a perplexed and mildly disgusted sneer and tries not to hurry away from them as quickly as he wants to. There is no way they know, he reminds himself. If they knew, he’d be dead already. But they might suspect. He’d initially written them off as mostly non-Force-sensitive, but come to think of it, being of the same order as Kylo Ren, he wouldn’t put it past them to be just Force-sensitive enough to pick up on his intentions. Just to spite him. 

He decides it wouldn’t hurt to tread lightly around them, either way, and makes a note to try and steer his thoughts away from anything to do with getting rid of Snoke as much as he can while they’re nearby.

He’d known the Knights of Ren would be an obstacle in his plan from the start, but had shelved them, perhaps too lightly, under the same category as the Stormtroopers and Snoke’s personal guard: threats that could be dismissed with some degree of ease once he’d won Kylo Ren over to his side. He’s seen no particular signs of loyalty to the Knights as far as Kylo is concerned: he may be their Master, but in the five years Hux has known him, he thinks he’s spent more time with him in the cold, dark halls of the Finalizer than with them. 

He might have to rethink this. The Knights may present a bigger threat to his plan than he’d initially bargained for. Because he absolutely needs one more thing to stress about.

Two of the massive lamps in the clearing have been turned onto Hux’s crippled shuttle, illuminating the exposed wing and durasteel belly where Stormtroopers in hazmat gear are currently working on fixing the damaged ion drive. Fuel cells have been stacked carefully in neat piles near the boarding ramp, where the rest of the squadron are sprawled in various states of relaxation. Their white armour is soiled with streaks of brown and green, leftover damage from the chaos of Starkiller base and general filth from crawling around in the jungle all day. 

They scramble up as Hux approaches, snapping to attention. One or two ludicrously try to scrub the filth off their armour with gloved hands, a reflex from years of spot inspections drilled into them during their stint on Hux’s ship. He ignores them, marching past them and up the unfolded landing ramp, ducking into the blessed cool of the shuttle, which is somehow still unaffected by the horrid climate of the planet. 

A soft footstep behind him makes him turn with a murderous glare; he’s not sure he can handle talking to anyone else right now without physically dismembering them.

“What do you want?” he practically shouts.

It’s XN-336. Hux knows because of the dried blood spattered on his thigh guard. The pilot takes a step back, retreating under Hux’s glare. “Uh. N-nothing, sir. I’ll just. I’ll just come back later.” He turns and practically runs down the ramp.

Hux slams his palm down on the keypad next to the airlock, hard enough to nearly dent it. The doors slide together with a satisfying hiss, shutting out the Stormtroopers and the sinister Knights and the sweltering heat of the planet.

Hux lets out a deep breath he didn’t realise he was holding. It’s almost too quiet inside the shuttle, after the constant bustle and noise of the jungle outside. His ears ring slightly in the silence, the rustle of his overcoat as he shrugs out of it almost too loud.

His exhaustion suddenly catches up with him in a wave strong enough to make his head swim, as if the immensity of everything that’s happened today has finally caught up with him all at once. He has to reach out and brace himself on the hull, closing his eyes for a second before straightening up again.

Some of the hidden compartments set into the hull of the shuttle have been opened and emptied of their contents; tools, emergency rations, survival gear. He takes four bacta strips from an open medkit on the floor, peeling the plastic seals off each before wrapping them carefully around the bottom joint of each finger on his left hand.  

One of the benches bolted to the wall is littered with sealant patches and at least half of the components of a disassembled tight-beam emitter, bolts and cartridges scattered haphazardly on the silver metal like the aftermath of a tiny explosion.

The other bench is empty, still marked with the pooling brown stain of Kylo Ren’s blood. Hux stands with his coat folded in his arms and looks between the two, trying to decide which offends him more: the thought of the work needed to unclutter the bench littered with tools, or the disgust of sleeping on someone else’s dried blood. He goes for the blood, because, to be honest, that’s actually not the most disgusting of Kylo Ren’s bodily fluids he’s had on his clothes today. The shuttle’s lights dim at his command.

He lies his coat down to one side as a makeshift pillow before slowly lowering himself onto the bench, his body aching all over, and slumping down back against the hull, feeling too tired to go to the effort of turning sideways and lying down on the coat-pillow, which seems very far away. His head all but swims, limbs feeling heavy with fatigue, as though the shuttle’s artificial gravity were still engaged on top of the planet’s normal gravitational field. His back stings painfully against the cold durasteel where the riverbank’s pebbles had chafed into his skin. Other parts of him sting worse. He ignores those. 

His eyes have just adjusted to the dark when he becomes aware of a shifting in the quality of the darkness, the atmospheric light in the shuttle shifting subtly between black and orange, black and orange. Hux sits up. Something is flashing from the cockpit, a small light, orange and blinking. He growls, about to try and disable it by tossing his boot at it when he realises it's coming from the comms panel. And XN-336 had been trying to tell him something…

It could only be an incoming hail from the Finalizer.

He gets up, ignoring his protesting muscles to hurry over to the panel, its myriad of buttons illuminated only in the brief orange flashes of the tiny lamp embedded at its head. Hux only needs one. He jams his thumb onto it, leaning closer slightly to speak into the mic panel. “Hux.”

He expects to hear Mitaka’s voice, but is pleasantly surprised by the clipped, cultured tones of his Captain instead.

“General Hux.”

“Phasma!” he all but shouts into the mic, “Where the hell have you been?”

“I was... indisposed, sir.” she replies, sounding about as put out by this as she ever gets, which is to say, not very. Her voice comes through crystal clear over the line; apparently the Stormtroopers have fixed their communications modulator.

“But you're alive? And unharmed?” Hux asks.

“Alive, sir, and the only harm I suffered was to my pride. I'm ashamed to say the traitor FN-2187 managed to overpower me, with the help of some Resistance scum.”

“Han Solo,” Hux guesses. “You'll be pleased to hear he's been taken care of.”

“But not before he managed to cripple the planet, apparently. It's really quite astounding. That one man and a Wookie managed to disable a weapon as powerful and fearsome as Starkiller Base.”

Something in the way she says it makes Hux raise an eyebrow, knowing she can’t see it. “Are you suggesting that my designs for the weapon were somehow flawed?”

“Wouldn't dream of it, sir,” she drawls in a tone of voice that suggests she actually rather would. “A well-placed bomb is enough to cripple even the most impenetrable of defenses. Apparently.”

Hux grunts with frustration, biting back the urge to launch into a full scale fight with her over the comm link. His exhaustion threatens to override the diplomacy beaten into him by his lineage, and he knows that whatever he says to her now will only come out sounding childish and defensive. He'll have words with her later, back on the Finalizer. For now, there are more urgent matters to discuss.

“I trust word of my survival has been appropriately broadcast on the ship?” he says instead. With Phasma’s return, he feels much safer that his position as General will remain intact, but it can’t hurt to be sure.

“I believe the two Stormtroopers assigned to outside hull duty have not been informed that their General is alive and well yet,” she replies, her sarcasm so well masked that Hux might have believed she was being serious if he didn’t know her, “I will personally see to it that it’s the first thing they hear upon reentering.”

“Yes, alright,” Hux says, tiredly.

“If you’d like to record to a personalized message, I’d be happy to have it broadcast in the airlock, sir.”

“Enough, Phasma. Thank you.” He sighs.

“What about the casualties?” he changes his line of inquiry, trusting Phasma to know he means Stormtrooper casualties in particular, the size of their military force first and foremost on his mind.

“We've lost a sizable number of soldiers, sir.” she reports, nothing in her voice indicating how she feels about this. “The Finalizer is running a skeleton staff, enough crew to pilot her and man the defenses, but a significant amount of manpower is being taken up with caring for the wounded and infirm.”

“Get them all on shuttles as soon as they can be moved. I need them off-ship. Get them proper medical attention, and get a reinforcement of ‘troopers in as fast as possible.”

“Sir? Are we to retaliate, then?”

Hux pauses. Phasma sounds eager, as always, to engage in head-on combat, having never been overly supportive of the long-range weaponry and strategic military advancement Hux himself favours. For once, Hux agrees with her. 

But the voice of Supreme Leader Snoke echoes in the back of his mind, forbidding an attack on the Resistance. Once again, Hux finds himself on the edge of the cliff of fate, teetering over the long, black fall into the unknown. One step would be all it takes for him to plunge head-first towards his destiny. One step...

“...Sir?” Phasma asks again. 

Hux realizes he's been quiet for too long. He makes the choice. The Finalizer is  _ his _ ship to command, and by god, he will command her. He steps abruptly off the cliff, not giving himself any time to doubt whether it's the right decision.

“Prepare the Finalizer for a full-scale retaliatory attack. All weapons hot. Start the plasma generators; I want maximum artillery load on all canons. And find the traitor FN-2187. We will annihilate him along with all his new friends in the Resistance.”

He can practically hear Phasma salute. “Sir.”

Hux takes a deep breath, the weight of disobeying a direct order from the Supreme Leader himself settling heavily onto his shoulders. Well. They haven't attacked the Resistance yet. They need to find them, first, and besides, he reasons, if everything goes to plan, Snoke will be dead by the time the Finalizer is ready to launch. With any luck, no one will find out about this little insubordination.

“And what of Kylo Ren, sir?” Phasma interrupts his thoughts.

Hux freezes, panicking for a moment, the question catching him off guard. But of course there's no way Phasma would be able to know all the things he'd just been doing with the aforementioned Ren tonight.

“What of him?” he asks cautiously.

“Did he make it out in one piece?”

Hux considers, relieved by the general safety of the question. “Insofar as all of his limbs are still more or less attached to his body.”

“I see.” Phasma replies, and again Hux wonders whether she's glad to hear it, or saddened, or whether she feels anything about it at all.

“We'll start making the preparations, General. I look forward to your return to the Finalizer.”

“Thank you, Captain.” He pauses, one finger resting on the button to kill the transmission, biting his lip on the last question he’s not sure it would be appropriate to ask. It’s been burning in the back of his mind since they got off Starkiller, a tiny little extra weight to add to the enormous burden of that clusterfuck of a day. To hell with it. He pulls his hand away. 

“Captain---” he starts. Phasma cuts him off.

“Millicent is fine, Hux,” she says, her tone softening a little. “She’s a little miffed that you haven’t been to see her. I’ll let you find all the little surprises she left in your quarters for yourself when you get back. She’s quite the spiteful little creature.”

The vast wave of relief that washes over Hux at Phasma’s words makes him realize he was perhaps more worried about the cat than he’d thought.

“Thank you, Captain.” he says, with a small but genuine smile, and cuts the transmission. 

With that, Phasma is gone, the blinking orange light of the comms panel flickering out and plunging the shuttle into darkness once more.

Hux runs his hand over his chin, staring at the panel absently and trying very hard not to think of what will happen to him should Snoke find out about this conversation. He won't, Hux decides. He'll be dead before he ever knows. Hux has this feeling in his bones, this kind of certainty that he's right about this. He hopes he can trust it.

The bench and his coat-pillow beckon him, and he makes his way back to the bow of the shuttle tiredly. This, he decides, is about as much as he is willing to put up with for one day. Deciding to commit treason of the highest order, secretly ordering his warship to mobilize, and, his personal favourite, screwing the Supreme Leader’s favourite acolyte right under his nose.

Some people like to tempt Fate. Hux is doing the equivalent of sticking his tongue out at it and insulting its mother.

He slumps down onto the coat-pillow in relief, all but melting into the steel of the bench. He's going to have to deal with the consequences of all of this at some point. But right now, all he wants to do is rest.

He wants to start formulating a strategy, start thinking of contingency plans and escape routes, of what he’s going to do about the Knights of Ren, but the moment his eyes close he’s lost to the world, sleep claiming him in barely a second’s time.


	6. I love it when a plan comes together

_ He raises his hand, turning his palm back and forth slowly. A wind of fire gusts his coat tails out behind him, eating the flesh off his fingers one by one, long strings of skin and sinew dripping to the ground. Around him the world is consumed by red. A woman crawls over the ground in front of him, bald, her skeleton showing under the deep gouges left by the fire-wind. Hux thinks she might be screaming, but all he hears is the white-noise-roar of Starkiller’s red beam. Soon all that remains of her is a shadow, charred into the ground. Soon Hux will also be a shadow.  _

_ Something makes him turn. Behind him stands Kylo Ren, perfectly whole and unaffected by the fire. Flames glint in hues of orange and yellow on the silver ornamentation of his mask, his cloak undulating gently on the hot wind. Hux thinks it’s unfair, that Kylo should be whole while he himself is melting, driblets of his face slipping to the ground. He reaches out with his ruined hand and manages to close skeletal fingers around a fistful of Kylo’s shirt--- _

Hux wakes with a start, the roar of the nuclear wind fading away under the pounding of his own heart, to find himself just inches away from the shiny black and silver gilding of a mask. 

“What the?” He sits up, scrambling backward on the steel bench until his back hits the wall, one hand already clutching his handblaster out of reflex.

For a second, the familiarity of the mask’s design makes him think it’s Kylo, but as the grogginess of sleep starts fading, he realizes it’s Scimitar Ren, straightening from where he’d been leaning over Hux, way too close for comfort. He’s silhouetted by a halo of entirely too bright light pouring in from the open airlock of the shuttle. Hux raises a hand to shield his eyes, peering at the Knight and taking deep breaths, willing his hammering pulse to slow. “What do you want?”

“Supreme Leader Snoke has summoned you.” Scimitar proclaims, then promptly turns on his heel, his cloak flaring a bit behind him as he walks out the airlock and down the landing ramp, the doors hissing shut behind him to douse the shuttle in cool darkness once more.

Hux blinks, a small, white afterimage burned into his lids from the airlock. He lifts his palms to rub at his eyes, mouthing “Supreme Leader Snoke has summoned you” sarcastically to himself. What a superb way to start the morning.

And what does Snoke want, anyway?

Straightening up, he swings his legs off the bench and runs a hand through his hair. His mind helpfully supplies him with several scenarios where Snoke has found out about Hux’s traitorous thoughts and has summoned him to his death. The rational part of his mind argues that, if that were the case, Scimitar Ren had ample time and opportunity to kill him while he slept, but didn’t. Unless Snoke wants to do the job himself, which, unless Hux has made a very grave error of judgement where Snoke’s physical prowess is concerned, he’s pretty sure he could take the Supreme Leader in a fair fight with a blaster at his side.

But that hypothesis relies rather heavily on the assumption that Hux is also right about Snoke being weak with the Force. All of the blasters in the world would make no difference if the Supreme Leader is able to stop energy bolts in midair with his mind.

Anyway, he reasons, it’s useless to speculate about the reason behind Snoke’s summons until he comes face to face with him and finds out what he wants in person, so he decides that he won’t worry about it for now. And almost immediately starts worrying about it again anyway.

He tugs his boots on and straps his handblaster to his thigh (just in case), his mind racing over the possibilities:

Kylo told Snoke Hux plans to conspire against him. Or Snoke pulled the information from his mind somehow (maybe he is stronger with the Force than Hux suspects, after all). Possibly, one of the Knights of Ren followed Kylo to the river last night and overheard them talking and… doing other things. Which. Is probably Hux’s least favourite conclusion.

In any case, he’s pretty sure Kylo Ren is somehow at the root of this. He pulls his hat down over his ears, fiddling with it perhaps a little longer than strictly necessary before realizing that he’s stalling. To hell with it. If Snoke means to kill him, he’ll face his death with honor.

Still, it’s with no small amount of trepidation that he makes his way to the Citadel. He has no way of telling the time, but judging by the quality of light - hazy and kind of blue-grey, just starting to tinge towards the oranges and pinks of dawn at the horizon - and how tired he still feels, it can’t be more than a few hours since he went to sleep. Too early to be awake again, anyway. 

The clearing is quiet, most Stormtroopers still asleep in their holosail tents (lucky assholes) or patrolling the perimeter. The happy pre-dawn birdsong echoing from the trees annoys Hux; it seems too light, too innocent set against the nervous tension settling in the back of his mind. And it’s hot, already, the lack of direct sunlight doing nothing to ease the thick quality of the oven-like air. 

The easily-missable entrance to the Citadel path looms up over him entirely too quickly. Long fronds of fern leaves sag over the entrance like the fingers of giant hands, ready to grab his shoulders and hair and drag him down into some unmentionably horrible place beneath the earth. He takes a deep breath, steeling himself before stepping through them, his shoulders drawing tense as the leaves drag over his back. 

The path today seems no less shrouded with mystery than it did the day before, for all that he’s walked it once and at least kind of knows where he’s going this time. But the eerily shifting light and ominous quality of the air is lost on Hux today. He hardly notices his own progress, apart from a vague sense of movement, shadows and leaves, so preoccupied with his upcoming meeting with Snoke that, when he exits out from the path to the Citadel clearing, he finds himself almost surprised, wondering how he got here and unable to remember the details.

Two black-clad Stormtroopers guard the doors again. With no distinguishing markings on their armour, he can’t be sure if it’s the same two as before. They step aside wordlessly as he wanders up to them, one pushing the doors open for him with one arm. They’re expecting him. Lovely.

The Citadel feels cold today, or perhaps it’s just his imagination. The outside light is not yet strong enough to penetrate the jagged remains of the ceiling, the smell of rotting foliage and vines much heavier now than it was before. The Knights are all present, already dressed in full black regalia with their masks firmly in place. 

Bombs Ren sits cross-legged on the floor, fiddling with some of the metal parts littered on the ground. Blaster Ren and Skullface Ren share a box-cum-seat, each with a ration packet in hand (Hux is kind of tempted to stick around just to see how in the world they mean to eat them with those silly masks on). Scimitar Ren leans against the wall by the entrance to Snoke’s hallway with his arms crossed. He tilts his chin down the hallway, indicating that Hux should follow, as if he were waiting for an invitation.

No sign of Kylo Ren. Hux wonders if he spent the night in Snoke’s chamber, begging the Supreme Leader’s forgiveness for plotting a coup with the Order’s youngest ever soon-to-be-ex-General.

He clenches his fists and stalks past Scimitar Ren, leveling him with his most disdainful stare. The mask gives no indication of Scimitar’s reaction, of course. It’s almost too dark to see in the hallway, and Hux has to step carefully to avoid stumbling over the littered rocks and crawling vines covering the floor.

To his surprise, the doors to Snoke’s throne room are wide open when he reaches them, flush against the walls of the corridor. He hesitates for only a moment, bracing himself, then steps inside to face his fate. 

There is no sign of Kylo Ren anywhere. This makes Hux pause. If he’d been sure of one thing, it was that Kylo would be there to make sure he could witness Hux’s downfall in person. In fact, Snoke is completely alone in the chamber, hunched over and small in his chair, wrapped in a large and ridiculous blanket. That goddamn beam of light still falls right on him, despite the fact that it’s barely dawn yet.

He straightens up and folds his hands behind his back. Snoke is alone. This is good. He gathers some courage from the sight. Unless his worst fears are confirmed and Snoke really is exceptionally strong with the Force, he’s starting to think he might just come out of this alive.

He wades up to the throne-chair to face Snoke, water sloshing around his ankles.

The Supreme Leader starts talking about the Resistance. Something about an intercepted transmission about a ship of some kind, maybe some mysterious coordinates. Hux makes appropriate noises at what he judges to be the correct intervals, but his lingering apprehension makes it hard for him to concentrate on what the Supreme Leader is saying, his guard so far up that it all but deafens him.

In the back of his mind, he notices little things, unconscious things of no importance: The Supreme Leader’s voice is nowhere near as deep as it is in his holo projections. One of his eyes is a milky kind of grey, perhaps blind. He’s missing a finger on his left hand.

It makes Hux wonder: How? How did this tiny, fragile being gain so much power? What terrible things has he done to take control of the First Order with that insignificant, frail body? How did he do those things?

And slowly, as time ticks on and the Supreme Leader doesn’t bring up his intentions to outright dispose of him, Hux slowly starts to relax, his shoulders lowering slightly and his breathing evening out. It might just be possible, he starts to theorize, that the Supreme Leader hasn’t brought him here to execute him.

Snoke prattles on about politics and the Skywalkers and the urgency of his inane desire to wipe them so thoroughly from the face of whatever planet they’re hiding on (“cowering, like the rodents that they are”) that it will be as though the Skywalker name never existed. He drawls on and on about Kylo Ren and his training, about making him the strongest Force user in the history of the galaxy. It’s a story Hux has heard approximately a million times before; one he’s gotten thoroughly tired of.

Still no talk of retaliation for Starkiller Base. No talk of furthering the First Order’s military strategies. No mention of the countless worlds where people are poor and suffering under the careless disregard of a New Republic so corrupt it will consume everything in its path in its quest for power before, eventually, eating itself from the inside out.

But lots and lots of drivel about meaningless trivialities. And as Snoke blathers on, Hux doesn’t know why he hasn’t seen it before. There are gaping holes in Snoke’s theories; his urge to kill the Jedi bordering on the edge of obsession. Now that the idea of Snoke being replaceable has taken root in Hux’s mind, he starts to see all his flaws as clear as day. It’s easy enough for him to nod along and agree, “Yes, sir”s and “Of course, Supreme Leader”s rolling off his tongue as lightly as the meaningless words they now are.

And when Snoke dismisses him with some orders he barely even registers, he salutes smartly, thumping his fist against his chest and slamming his heels together, and leaves the chamber, allowing his lip to curl once his back is turned to Snoke. He was right. Snoke needs to go.

He sloshes to the door and steps out into the corridor, feeling triumphant and hopeful, the happiest he’s been since the destruction of his planet. And almost immediately runs nearly headlong into Kylo Ren.

It’s embarrassingly awkward for both of them. Ren kind of shuffles around, looking anywhere but at Hux, hands clenched in fists at his sides and his hair kind of dripping over his scar. He’s changed, again, into uniform pants and a tunic resembling his old, ruined one - layered leather sleeves disappearing under a coarse surcoat belted at the waist. Hux, having had to wear the same uniform for a number of days now, resents him for it.

He glares at him, crossing his arms and bulldozing over his own feelings of awkwardness. He’s still angry at Kylo for his blunt dismissal the night before, humiliated by his own injured pride at being so carelessly cast aside when it was Kylo fucking Ren, of all the terrible choices in sexual partners Hux could have made, doing the casting. 

“You’re in the way,” he clips out. Kylo doesn’t move, firmly planted in the hallway and just broad enough to prevent Hux from pushing past him.

“I heard Leader Snoke wanted an audience with you,” Kylo mutters towards the ground, his words kind of falling over themselves. He says it quietly, maybe afraid that Snoke will hear. And now that Hux looks at him more closely, he can see him breathing slightly faster than usual, as if he’d run to the Citadel. Did he seriously---

“And, what,” Hux asks with a tilt of his head, “you came to... rescue me? From Snoke? Cute. But as you can see, I will not be in need of any rescuing today. Now get out of my way.”

He puts a hand on Kylo’s shoulder and pushes him back enough to step past him, stalking down the hall away from Snoke’s doors. To his annoyance, Kylo follows.

He falls into step next to Hux, talking in hushed tones. “He doesn’t know?”

Hux assumes he means Leader Snoke. “No, he doesn’t know. He doesn’t even suspect. For someone with his reputation for being a fearsome Sith or whatever his allegiance is, I’m disappointed. Really Kylo, is he even Force-sensitive at all? Or just some old geezer---”

He cuts off with what is certainly not a yelp as Kylo suddenly grabs him and slams him up against the wall, shushing him with a forefinger pressed against Hux’s lips. “Not so loud. The Knights of Ren are right down the hall. If they hear you…”

“How fond are you of that finger?” Hux grinds out between his teeth, leveling him with a homicidal stare. Kylo quickly pulls his hand away from Hux’s lips.

Hux puts both hands on Kylo’s shoulders and shoves him back hard enough to make him stumble, stepping up and leaning right into his personal space, an intimidation technique he learned from his father. It's never worked on Kylo before, but there's a first time for everything.

“No one is going to hear me,” he hisses. “Listen to me, Kylo.  The First Order’s most powerful weapon just got destroyed by the Resistance, and instead of raining holy fire down on them, Snoke brings you here, alone. Why? Why would he do that?”

Kylo is actually backing down a bit, teetering backwards away from Hux. The burn-scar slashed over his face glistens in the low light just starting to illuminate the hallway. Hux takes a step forward, using their almost equal heights to his advantage to bear down on him until Kylo’s back hits the wall. Vines and leaves rustle underneath his boots.

“Leader Snoke plans to rally the Order around you. You're to be a figurehead, a symbol. Kylo Ren, so devoted to the cause he killed his own father, Kylo Ren, slayer of the last remaining Jedi and sole inheritor of the Force. He plans to use you, and there will be no escape from this one.”

“Let Snoke use me if he wants,” Kylo retorts, “My only desire is to get to Skywalker, and get revenge on that pathetic scavenger.” 

Hux bites back a frustrated growl. He knows he’s close to swaying Kylo to his cause, he can feel it. He just needs the right angle to persuade him. He changes course. “Snoke’s allowing your continued existence because your goals align, for now. You both want Skywalker dead, for some goddamn obscure reason I don’t think it’s physically possible for me to care less about. But if you kill him, then what? What becomes of the Jedi Killer when there are no more Jedi left? You think he’s just going to let you carry on?”

“You just said he was going to pin me up as some kind of obscene figurehead for the Order. Now he’s going to kill me?” Kylo asks mulishly. They’re both hissing like insane people, all but spitting in each other’s faces. 

Hux gives him a look. “I find both outcomes equally objectionable. You’re worth more to the First Order than being Snoke’s puppet, and we definitely benefit more from having you alive and able to use the Force. And I’m not going to allow Snoke the satisfaction of getting rid of you so easily, either way. If we want to move against him, now is the time. He’s here. He’s mostly alone, vulnerable...” He trails off, because Kylo is staring at him. “...What?”

“...You won’t allow him to kill me?”

Hux rolls his eyes. “Oh for god’s sake, Ren,  _ focus _ .” 

Kylo’s eyes slide away from Hux as he deflates, looking suitably admonished. “Alright. Sorry. I just.” He presses a hand over his face, carding it back through his hair as he looks up at Hux again. “It’s not that I don’t understand your reasoning, Hux. You’re passionate about the First Order, I get it. You really believe in whatever it is you think you stand for. But Snoke is the closest thing I’ve had to a father. A second--- a real--- not Han Solo.” His eyes are soft and pleading. “Understand that killing him is not a choice I can make lightly, nor quickly.” 

Of course. Hux should have known. He kind of deflates, whatever he would have said next stringing out of his throat in a long, soft sigh. He rests one hand in a fist on top of Kylo’s chest. Sentimental fool. He should have known. 

He can’t even stay mad at Kylo, not when he’s this close, not when he’s looking at him like that with those soft, sad eyes. In fact, Hux finds he really rather wants to kiss him again, actually, because apparently he died on Starkiller Base and has been transported to some ludicrous version of his own personal hell, where things like wanting to kiss Kylo Ren are starting to feel normal.

He doesn’t act on it, gathering his will and taking a step back from him, lowering his hand to his side. “Fine. Just… don’t take too long to think about it. I’m doing this. And I need to know if I can trust you.”

“Hux, I…” Kylo casts around, his gaze sliding to the floor, and finishes with a sigh, slumping back against the wall, “I don’t even trust myself.” He has this tormented look on his face, his eyebrows scrunched and twisting the scar over his cheek, and his eyes shining in the low light. “I just need time.”

“We don’t have it.” Hux replies softly, curtly, pulling away from him and reaching up to tug on his hat to give his hands something to do other than reach out and touch Kylo’s cheek. “I move against Snoke at dawn tomorrow. If you’re in, come find me. If not,” he narrows his eyes at Kylo, “Stay the hell out of my way.”

Kylo looks up to meet his eyes, holding his stare for a second. His power prickles over Hux, feeling sickly green somehow, if Hux could put words to it, and the conflicted, sad look in his eyes is gone, replaced by a kind of dull glare. Kylo’s emotions are like a switch, as always, flicking between states faster than Hux can keep track of. Hux wonders if it isn’t exhausting.

Kylo turns and shoves past him, shoulder checking Hux hard enough to make him stagger before stalking through the doors into the entry hall. Hux fights the extremely strong urge to give his retreating back the middle finger, and instead tugs on his overcoat to straighten it. He’ll have to pass the Knights again to leave, following in Kylo’s wake like a berated dog. He finds it more humiliating than he should, and stalls as long as he can before quickly trudging out of the corridor. 

He shoulders past Scimitar Ren, still hulking near the doorway, and firmly ignores the tilting masks of the other Knights as they turn to follow his progress. Hux is getting thoroughly sick of them staring at him all the time. He notices a distinct absence of Kylo Ren, though - the man has a knack for just disappearing like he was never even there. How he manages to move that fast with his injuries, Hux does not know.

Hux’s thoughts race as he weaves through the makeshift camp set up in the entry hall, temporarily forgetting to guard any thoughts of his imminent insubordination from the potentially Force-sensitive Knights. 

It will not be easy to get to Snoke. The Knights of Ren have been very strategically set up practically at his side, and any commotion at the Citadel would bring the entire squadron of the Supreme Leader’s personal guard down on his head.

He’s also not entirely sure his own Stormtroopers wouldn’t join the fray, against him. He has absolute faith in their conditioning to be almost mindlessly loyal to the Order. And he did shoot one in the leg. Which. Upon reflection, not his finest move.

Even if Kylo decides to join Hux in this, it would be two of them against a force stronger than twenty. And no matter how powerful a Force-user Kylo may be, Hux suspects the four Knights of Ren by themselves will be quite sufficient to keep him occupied - if he’d even be willing to go up against them at all. Leaving Hux to deal with nineteen fully-armed, fully-armoured Stormtroopers by himself. And Hux may be a confident combatant, but he knows his limits.

As things stand, a direct assault on the Citadel would be risky, if not downright ludicrous.

But as he steps out of the Citadel doors and heads over the mossy ground toward the path back to the clearing, stepping over overgrown roots and curling, green vines, something tugs at the back of his mind. Something Phasma said.  _ A well-placed bomb is enough to cripple even the most impenetrable of defenses... _

The Citadel’s clearing only has this one point of entry. Dense jungle trees, ferns and vines ring the glade around it, forming a protective, impenetrable wall around the ruins. As much as Hux finds the lack of a direct route from the campsite to the Citadel annoying, as far as strategic defense goes, he can appreciate the merits of this setup: limit the points of entry to your defensible space, and simply focus all your resources on those points. It makes sense. But it also swings the other way: If Hux can block that entrance, it will block the majority of Snoke’s guard and his own Stormtroopers from reaching the Citadel for some time, breaking the amount of shit he’ll have to deal with up into neat little chunks. 

It will at least buy him some time to take care of the Knights of Ren while the Stormtroopers break through the barricade. He allows himself a small, private smirk as he passes under the overhanging branches and into the shrouded path. The new light of dawn dapples into squares and triangles outlined by the shadows of leaves. Something small scampers into the undergrowth, startled by his approach, burrowing into the green with a rustle as he passes it. The trees girding the path are old and thick, their barks lush with yellow moss and a multitude of tiny flowers. 

Beautiful, Hux muses. 

They will shatter and collapse just like the oscillators of Starkiller Base were shattered by Resistance bombs. And Hux knows just how to do this.

His resolve strengthened, he makes his way back to the clearing and the shuttle. A breeze has picked up again, probably heralding more rain, but even this is not enough to dampen his mood as he treads back to the campsite, clambering over a giant, twisted root sticking over the ground before ducking past the creepy hand-ferns and into the clearing.

It’s gotten light outside, the purple-blue of predawn shifting into the bright, cloudless azure of day. As he exits into the campsite, there are black- and white-clad Stormtroopers all over the place, some sitting on ration boxes to clean their rifles, some gathered in a little group trying to make a fire, two engaged in hand-to-hand combat training on the edge of the clearing, a ring of six surrounding them, cheering them on. The stilted lights have been packed into neat heaps of metal beams and screens, piled to one side of the clearing near some ration boxes.

A ‘trooper in hazmat gear is swallowed up to the waist into the engine house of the shuttle, one stilted and bandaged leg wiggling as he tries to duck in under the peeled back panels of the wing. Another periodically passes him tools from a big, open toolkit at his feet. The shuttle’s fuel cells sit to one side, unguarded and glowing gently blue. It’s these Hux heads for, keeping his posture stiff and official, hands folded behind his back, hopefully confident enough not to look suspicious. 

He lets his eyes flicker around the clearing and times his approach to a moment when no one seems to be watching. Reaching down as he passes, he scoops up one fuel cell in each hand, handling them carefully by the rubber grips fixed to the support struts of each cell case. These fuel cells are, by their nature and the virtue of their location close to the shuttle’s ion drive, highly radioactive. Their lead casing contains the radiation to a degree safe enough to be handled without special gear, but regulation dictates that they should be handled with tongs at all times. Hux doesn’t have time for that.

The shuttle’s fuel cells are perhaps a bit extravagant for the design he has in mind (as far as explosives go, nuclear ones are rather more powerful than strictly needed to incapacitate the native flora). But they'll get the job done. Hux needs to know there is at least one highly destructive force he can depend on to ruin someone’s day (not including Kylo Ren, whom he still isn't sure about).

No one calls him out as he makes his way up the ramp and into the cool, dark hull of the shuttle, fuel cells held gingerly in front of him, as close to his chest as he dares. He’s not afraid of them, not exactly. But he has a healthy and perfectly reasonable respect for radiation. 

He expects to be alone in the shuttle, but movement deeper inside the hull catches his eye. He pauses, the fuel cells hovering in front of his stomach, his eyes prickling as they adjust to the sudden dim light.

In the cockpit, XN-336 is half-raised out of the pilot’s seat, frozen under Hux’s stare. The blinking orange light of the comms link reflects on his white helmet, mirrored in duplicate like tiny, glowing embers in his black visor before fading out as the link cuts out.

Incoming comm. The Finalizer. Phasma reporting about their very secret and definitely very unsanctioned mobilization. 

And here XN-336 is. Aware of Hux’s insubordination.

Hux pieces all of this together in the time it takes him to step fully into the shuttle. 

“General,” XN-336 greets, softly, sounding apprehensive.

Hux doesn’t meet his gaze, reaching down to carefully place his fuel cells on the metal bench before unclipping the top of his holster and slowly unsheathing his handblaster. This is really such a shame. He’s taken somewhat of a liking to the Stormtrooper pilot, had even thought he might make a good lieutenant under Captain Phasma.

He keeps his eyes on the blaster, carefully clicking the safety off with his thumb, the leather of his glove sliding smoothly over the metal switch. He checks that it isn’t set to ‘stun’. “You spoke to the Finalizer, I presume.”

XN-336’s shoulders sink, his helmet tilting slightly towards where his rifle is propped up against the wall of the cockpit.

Hux raises his blaster, leveling it at the Stormtrooper’s face. “Don’t.”

“General. You don't have to do this.” XN-336 raises his hands in a gesture of peace. To his credit, his voice waivers only a little.

“Did anyone else hear the transmission?” Hux asks, his hand steady.

“No, sir. I was the only one on board the shuttle.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, sir.”

Hux’s finger depresses the trigger of the blaster slightly. XN-336 cringes down, hands jerking up to cover his face. “General, wait, please. You’re right. You’re right about mobilizing the Finalizer.”

Hux pauses, his finger relaxing, and lowers the blaster a fraction. 

“The Supreme Leader’s orders to withhold retaliation don’t make any sense,” the ‘trooper continues, falling over his words a bit when he realizes his head is still in one piece, “We should be launching a full-scale attack on them.”

Hux has often found staying quiet to be the best way to get someone to talk. People seem to have an almost evolutionary urge to fill the silence with words, and the longer they talk, the more they seem to have to say. 

“We lost good men on Starkiller base,” XN-336 elaborates, predictably, his voice raising hopefully when Hux doesn’t immediately put a bolt through his head. “Some of them were my friends. I can’t forgive that.”

He sounds sincere enough. Hux lowers his arm, but doesn’t re-holster the blaster. He regards the ‘trooper suspiciously. “What I am intending is treason of the highest degree. You’ve been conditioned to be loyal to the First Order. It seems to me like this could be a conflict of interest.”

“With respect, sir, it is exactly because of my loyalty to the Order that I agree with disobeying the Supreme Leader’s orders. Since we were small, we were always taught the First Order cares about the little man. Every single holo in the rec room is a record of the poor and suffering planets the Order’s taken over. They’re thriving now. People can eat.”

Propaganda. Hux has seen the holos. He’s been directly responsible for the creation of many of them. But now would likely not be the opportune moment to inform the pilot how biased they really are. At its core, Hux believes XN-336’s version of the First Order’s policy to be correct. But for them to truly bring the kind of order to the galaxy they strive for, they must first win the war against the Resistance, and war is many things, hardly any of them good. 

“Sir,” the pilot continues, “I can’t believe that the same Order who would do that for some poor, nameless planets on the Outer Rim wouldn’t rain hellfire down on the enemies who killed so many of our own. Our friends. They’re the only family we have, General, and now they’re gone. No, sir. The only conflict of interest here is between Snoke and our prime directives.”

Hux takes a closer look at the ‘trooper. It’s impossible to judge his sincerity with his eyes behind that infernal mask.

“Take off your helmet, XN-336.”

He immediately complies, reaching up to tug off the white mask, revealing a face perhaps Hux’s age, dark amber skin and big, round eyes under heavy eyebrows, handsome in a conventional way. Sweat runs in rivulets down his face and temples. Hux knows the feeling, his own hair plastered to his forehead from the morning heat beating down on him. He suspects quite a larger percentage of the ‘trooper’s sweat stems from fear, though.

He narrows his eyes, fixing the pilot with a look. “Can I trust you, ‘trooper?”

“Of course, General,” the pilot replies without hesitation. Of course, Hux reasons, he would probably get the same answer if he’d asked XN-336 whether he had the ability to sprout wings and fly away. Regardless, one sure ally is better none.

“Mobilizing the Finalizer is but the first part of a far larger, more sinister plan. This is a full-scale coup, XN-336. And I need to know how far you are willing to go to see this through.”

There’s a pregnant silence between them before XN-336 replies: “General. How far are  _ you _ willing to go?”

“I mean to kill the Supreme Leader.” says Hux, and the words fall like stones around him, heavy with finality.

The ‘trooper stares at him in plain shock, his jaw literally dropping, and if it weren’t for the seriousness of the situation Hux might find it amusing. 

“...G-general…” he sputters, “That’s. I can’t---”

“Oh, don’t worry. I won’t expect you to do any trigger-pulling.”

XN-336 visibly sags in relief. Hux flips the safety on his handblaster before holstering it, another piece of the puzzle falling neatly into place. He suspects he can trust XN-336, at least for the time being, a fact he plans to take advantage of for as long as he’ll be allowed.

“No,” he says, the corner of his mouth twitching up into a slight smile, “I have something else in mind for you.”

He picks up the fuel cells again, one in each hand, their neon glow outlining the ridges of his fingers a bright azure. “Tell me, 336. How much do you know about explosives?”


	7. How to make friends and influence people

It’s nearing sunset outside when Hux sits back, reaching up to wipe the sweat off his brow with the back of one hand as he surveys his handiwork. The inside of the shuttle is dark and sweltering, any trace of coolness it may have retained long since evaporated into the steaming heat of day. The soft patter of rain drones against the viewport, the yellow glow from the shuttle’s overhead lights mixing with the gentle blue of the shuttle’s fuel cells, casting wavering shadows against the airlock doors.

He sits cross-legged on the floor opposite XN-336, and between them sit four small bombs, tiny fusion grenades hastily assembled from the fuel cells and whatever spare parts they could find. They’re crude, rudimentary by necessity for the lack of available resources, but vicious, each egg-shaped bomb a rough-hewn mess of complicated wiring and rough metal piping small enough to fit in Hux’s palm. 

XN-336’s dissected blaster rifle is scattered in pieces around them. Copper wiring writhes in a bundle on the floor near the bench. Bolts and screws and magnetized tubing are scattered in a small minefield around them.

Hux’s sleeves are rolled up just under his elbows, his shirt clinging to his back with sweat. His gloves are folded neatly on the bench on top of his greatcoat and overcoat, hat perched on top, his throbbing heat-induced headache finally winning over the need for recognizable authority hours ago. His hair is plastered to his forehead, and sweat trickles constantly down his neck.

“Are you sure this will give you enough time, sir?” asks XN-336, still bent over the last bomb with a tiny, hand-held welder, the Stormtrooper mask acting as temporary safety glasses.

“I’m sure.” Hux says, brushing metal dust off the top of his own bomb.

“It’s just,” the pilot says hesitantly, “and I mean absolutely no disrespect, General, you understand, but, sir, are you sure that your calculations for the fusion reaction times are correct?”

“Of course I’m sure.” Hux levels him with a non-verbal ‘who do you think I am?’ look. He’s a brilliant engineer, and these bombs are so basic he’s sure even Kylo Ren could make the calculations. He explains again: “Once the temporary casing is cracked open, it’ll take approximately ten seconds for the fuel from the cell to drain completely into the plasma from the rifle.”

“Then boom, fusion.” XN-336 completes.

Hux raises an eyebrow. “Boom. Fusion?”

XN-336 has the decency to look sheepish, finishing his welding before sitting up to look at Hux and sliding the Stormtrooper helmet off his head, his voice clearing from the distortion of the helmet into a smooth baritone. “In a manner of speaking, sir.”

Hux looks at their handiwork, nodding slowly. The perfectionist in him cringes at the rudimentary nature of the bombs, but the tiny part of him that eternally screams and rages and only finds peace when he’s exacting the bitterest violence on someone finds itself rather looking forward to seeing how much damage they’ll be able to do. 

“I suppose they will get the job done,” he hums.

“And you’re sure the casing will hold until you crack the tube, sir? If even a little fuel leaks into the plasma too soon…”

“For god’s sake, 336,” he says, exasperated, “Yes, I’m sure. This design is so rudimentary even a child could build it.”

“Sorry, sir.”

Hux sits back, stretching his arms above his head and rolling his aching neck. He makes a face as he smells himself. It’s past time for a long shower and a change of clothes, and the rations and water he’d shared with XN-336 at midday are starting to feel very distant. As there don’t appear to be any showers on this godforsaken planet, a dip in the river and a change of clothes will do, after he’s secured some more food. He gets to his feet slowly, thighs still protesting from where they’d been splayed open far too wide over Kylo’s ridiculously huge thighs the night before. He’ll admit it’s a rather pleasant ache, when he cares to remember the cause of it.

One of the hidden panels built into the hull of the shuttle should contain two spare sets of Stormtrooper armour, as per Order regulations. Hux would literally rather lick Supreme Leader Snoke’s feet before being caught wearing Stormtrooper armour, but the black undershirt and breeches that greet him when he palms open the panel are practically calling his name.

He grabs them, and stuffs a pair of charcoal-colored socks into his pocket before stepping carefully over the littered debris of bomb-parts towards the airlock. A ration bar from XN-336’s field kit (flavoured with seeds and spices, none of that sweet swill Kylo brought him yesterday) goes into his other pocket. 

The airlock hisses open at his command, and he turns back to nod his chin at the bombs. “Hide these. I’ll be back for them later.”

XN-336 inclines his head, starting to gather up the bombs.

“Dawn,” Hux reminds the ‘trooper, “You’ll be ready?”

“Yes, sir,” 336 nods, and Hux hopes that he can trust him.

He steps outside into the heat of day. There’s little activity in the camp. Three of Hux’s Stormtroopers are still working inside the bowels of the shuttle, and a few others are dotted around the clearing performing maintenance on their armour and weapons, for the most part, but no black armour breaks the array of white, and no Knights of Ren are waiting to stare at him as he passes.

Thunder drones in the distance, but the rain has mostly passed, a few last, stray drops pattering on the durasteel wing of the shuttle and the ground squelching disgustingly under Hux’s feet. He’s practically inhaled the ration bar before he even reaches the path to the river, discarding the wrapper behind one of the boxes in the clearing before ducking through the trees.

He makes straight for the bubbling roar of the river, his burning need to get clean speeding his steps until he is all but jogging along the path. The dim, orange light of sunset brings with it giant, churning clouds of gnats, swarming at exactly the height of Hux’s face. He waves his hand irritatedly before him, trying desperately not to breathe in any of the tiny insects. Rationally, he knows he doesn’t, but by the time he breaks out of the path and onto the smooth, round pebbles of the riverbank, he’s convinced he feels their tiny wings tickling up his nose and inside his mouth. He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, then pauses. A sputtering, electric hum drones above the roar of the river. It’s a sound Hux is familiar with.

He looks over to find Kylo Ren on the bank of the river, close to the log where they’d fucked the day before. He’s stripped down to his breeches and boots and has his lightsaber in hand, ignited and crackling. Its light glints off the sheen of sweat covering his torso, bathing his skin alternately crimson and pale. 

He’s practising some kind of kata, swaying and twirling, the lightsaber blurring as he spins into wide, arching slashes. The bandages on his side have been replaced, but the large lightsaber wound stretching over his shoulder and into his face remains uncovered, glistening and wet. And he’s lost the sling, his arm trembling slightly under the weight of the ‘saber.

Kylo’s movements alter between graceful and fast, heavy and violent, and Hux counts at least three different opportunities for an opponent to get a potential hit in. He admits, grudgingly, that said opponent would have to have survived all of the not insignificant power of Kylo Ren crashing down on them up to that point, which, even without his use of the Force, is not inconsiderable. Ren fights like a tidal wave, immense and uncompromising.

It’s on a particularly complicated spin that he falters, his injured arm dipping and bringing the flaming cross-guard of the ‘saber dangerously close to his stomach, before losing his grip on it entirely. He drops it with a loud curse, stumbling to the left slightly before regaining his balance. The red light of the ‘saber flickers out as it hits the ground, skittering over the pebbles towards Hux. Hux stops it underneath the toe of one boot.

Kylo looks up at him, one hand pressed to his injured shoulder, breathing hard. Hux bends to pick up the ‘saber, holding it towards Kylo with the crossguard reversed towards himself. 

“It's no wonder that scavenger girl nearly killed you,” he sneers at Kylo, “I've seen Ewoks executing a more graceful remise.”

Kylo prowls over to him, fists clenched at his sides and scowling, and makes to grab the ‘saber from him, but Hux pulls it away at the last moment, holding it up out of reach. Kylo makes a face at him. “Really?”

Hux ducks past him, walking over to the log and laying his clean Stormtrooper under-gear neatly next to the crumpled pile of black he assumes is Kylo’s tunic. He straightens up and turns, starting as he finds himself almost flush up against Kylo, who has no right to move that softly for someone as big as he is.

He wrenches the lightsaber away just in time as Kylo lunges for it, sidestepping out of his way neatly.

“Do you have an answer for me yet?” Hux asks, crossing his arms over his chest with the ‘saber in one hand when Kylo doesn't immediately make a grab for it again. 

“No.” Kylo answers, holding out one hand, palm up. “Give me back my lightsaber.”

“I’ll give it back in exchange for your assistance in killing Leader Snoke.” Hux teases, reaching out and running the tip of the lightsaber’s hilt lightly down Kylo’s nose, but Kylo turns his hand around and uses the Force to wrench it from Hux’s fingers before it arrives at his lips, aggressively enough to hurt. Hux frowns at him, resisting the urge to rub his palm and resting his hands on his hips instead.

“I need more time.” Kylo says softly, his tone dangerous, slipping the ‘saber into the sheath on his belt. Hux can’t give him this. He knows Kylo well enough to realize he can’t allow him too much time to think. He’s weak, and Snoke is in his head always, one way or the other, whether the Supreme Leader really can use the Force to ingratiate himself into the minds of others or Kylo just imagines him there himself.

Behind Kylo, the river beckons, its cool, clean water all but yelling at Hux to hurry things up and get in there. Mist shrouds the opposite bank again, the green of the jungle canopy just peaking out in the distance.

“Destiny is calling, Kylo,” he says, “I need your answer now. Are you on my side or are you against me?”

“I don’t know!” Kylo snarls, looking back at Hux with a frown and gesturing widely, “I need more time.”

“We don't have any more time,” Hux bites back, “I move against Snoke at sunrise.”

Kylo makes a frustrated growl, reaching up to bury both hands in his thick hair and tugging on it as he turns to pace in front of Hux, his steps heavy and stomping. Waste of energy. Hux has never understood why walking side to side would be conducive to any kind of cognizance. 

“Leader Snoke is… He’s everything to me. Don’t you understand? I am what I am because of him.” Kylo’s words rush out in a jumble, fast and disorientated.

“Snoke didn’t give you your powers,” Hux points out, “They come from inside you. All he’s done is show you how to use them.” 

“He was my father when Han Solo discarded me.” Kylo replies, and his voice waivers enough to make Hux wonder if he’s going to start crying. He fights the urge to roll his eyes. Wonderful. Hux could pull his own hair out.

“And who’s to say Snoke won’t discard you too?” he says, frustrated. “He needs you right now, Ren. But in the end, he will betray you.”

Kylo stops his pacing to look at Hux. “And you won’t?”

“I don’t have any reason to,” Hux answers simply. “I want what you have to offer. I need your power to gain my own, and as long as I have you at my side, we will rule the Order more successfully than anyone in its history. This I have no doubt of.”

Kylo tilts his head to the side, regarding Hux with a serious expression. “But we have to kill Leader Snoke.”

Hux nods. “Yes.”

He’s about to mention that the Knights of Ren will have to be dealt with as well, but bites the inside of his cheek to stop the words escaping. It doesn’t seem like Kylo needs to be reminded of that particular detail right now.

Kylo sighs, running a hand through his hair and closing his eyes. “I just… need more time. Can you just wait? One more day. Please.”

“Sunrise, Kylo.” Hux puts his foot down. “Will you be by my side?”

“I don't know,” he growls, “I don't know! Do you even realize what you're asking me to do?”

“Yes.” Hux answers, staring him down.

Kylo glares at Hux, the scar over his nose twisting. Then his lightsaber is in his hand again, flaring to life with that hateful static crackle. Kylo’s face, bathed in red, is murderous. Hux goes cold, lowering his arms to his side and taking half a step back, certain for a moment that Kylo is going to lunge at him. 

Instead, Kylo whirls on his heel with a frustrated shout, a few short stomps carrying him to the treeline. He lashes at the moss-covered trunks and creeping vines with the ‘saber, shouting incoherently. Hux exhales shortly, biting his lip, and then he’s rushing after Kylo quite before he even knows what he’s doing, his mind yelling “ _ what are you doing what are you doing what are you-- _ ” at him even as he grabs onto Kylo tightly from behind. He clutches onto his waist and holds on for dear life.

Kylo’s swing falters, unbalanced by Hux’s weight. “What are you doing!” he yells at him, mirroring Hux’s mind-voice almost exactly in tone and volume. Leaves and shards of bark erupt all around them, spat into the air by the flailing lightsaber.

“Stop, Kylo!” Hux shouts back at him, “Calm down!”

Kylo struggles under him, thrashing, the smell of burning leaves and wood searing Hux’s nose as the ‘saber slashes them to pieces. The blade arcs dangerously close to his face, hot enough to singe, and he flinches away, his neck stinging with the sudden, jerking movement. His heart pounds in his ears.

Hux’s feet leave the ground for a moment as he reaches up to grab Kylo’s lashing arm, using all his strength to pull it down. Perhaps because of the injury to Kylo’s shoulder, the arm actually staggers, then sinks down slowly, much to Hux’s surprise. The bicep muscle is knotted tensely enough under his hand to feel like stone. Kylo’s skin blazes.

“Let me go,” he grinds out, twisting back against him and tugging on his arm. Hux’s grip nearly slips in the sweat dripping over Kylo’s shoulder, but he grapples with him, shifting his hand so he can use his forearm to pin him to his chest instead.

“No.” Hux says softly, but firmly, leaning forward to press the word over Kylo’s ear. Kylo’s whole body is heaving, trembling in Hux’s arms. “Calm down. Just be calm.”

Somehow, it works. Kylo’s thrashing slows into a kind of half-hearted convulsing, then eventually stops entirely. He sinks to his knees with a long, shaky exhale, Hux still clinging to his back, pinning both his arms to his sides. He can feel his heart pounding against Kylo’s back.

The lightsaber fizzles out, the sounds of the river and birds and far-off thunder rushing in to fill the sudden silence. Hux holds on until he's relatively sure Kylo won’t try to impale him, then lets go all at once, letting himself fall back, away from him. His heart is still racing and he feels flushed, adrenaline surging through his body. And. Fuck. He is definitely going to need to do some introspection on why being put in mortal peril by Kylo Ren seems to be an instant aphrodisiac for him. He scowls down at his erection, knowing that glaring at it will not make it go away, but willing to try it anyway. It doesn't work, of course. 

He sighs, looking up at Kylo’s back.

Kylo is bent over himself, his face hidden behind his hair, his back still rolling with heavy breaths. Hux reaches out, tentatively laying a hand on his shoulder. When he doesn't flinch away, Hux shifts to his knees, tugging on Kylo’s shoulder until he turns around to face him.

A bead of sweat runs over Kylo’s brow, catching on the ridge of the raw wound slicing open his cheek and crawling down it into his neck. Hux follows it with his eyes, then on an impulse, leans up and follows it with his mouth. 

He’s half surprised when Kylo doesn’t immediately push him away, so he lets his lips trail over his face, leaving a long, slow kiss over his mouth. When Kylo doesn’t kiss back, Hux pulls away to look at him. His face is crumpled into a kind of confused mess of emotion, alarm warring with anger and pain in his eyes. And. Hux has to pause for a moment to wonder again what bizarre alternate reality he’s been transported to, because he finds himself actually feeling sorry for him, a kind of warm feeling worming its way into his stomach. Hux tries to stomp on it, but it squirms away and up into his chest somewhere, unreachable. He opts to just ignore it for the time being.

“Look, Kylo,” he begins softly, “For too long you’ve let yourself be tamed. Snoke, the Force, Darth Vader. Forget all of them. The only master you need is yourself.”

Kylo stares at him. “If I don't have them, I don't have anything. I'm not strong enough without their help.”

Hux looks at him, letting his eyes flick between Kylo’s. Hux has always been an eloquent man; his ability to both inspire and manipulate people with words has been the single largest stepping stone on his path to becoming the youngest General in the history of the First Order. But faced with the sad softness in Kylo’s eyes, he finds himself yet again without words, not really knowing how to respond, or what to say to convince Kylo he’s wrong.

The tranquil thrum of the river and the warbling sing-song of a myriad tiny forest birds pours into the silence between them. Hux takes a breath, and does the only thing he can think of in the moment: crawls forward and clambers into Kylo’s lap, taking his face in both hands and kissing him again. This time, he’s met halfway, Kylo’s nose bumping his slightly before their lips meet. For a long time, it’s just their mouths and tongues and wet, sloppy sounds and spit trailing down Hux’s chin, the jungle and the river slowing to a complete stop around them.

Hux lets one hand slip down, finding the bulge of Kylo’s cock and pressing down, tracing its outline with his fingers. He finds him straining against his pants already and smirks a little, pleased that Kylo’s body seems to have the same reaction to him than his does to Kylo. He bends forward to smear kisses over Kylo’s chin, glancing down periodically to free his erection from his breeches. His fingers can’t quite close around its girth, which explains how magnificently sore he still is from having him inside him. Kylo’s hands come to rest on Hux’s waist, thankfully without any mention of Hux’s dimensions this time. He’s pulled away from the kiss to bite his lower lip. Hux drags his hand up and down his cock lightly, enjoying the way Kylo’s eyes slide shut and the way he inhales through his nose sharply. 

He lets go, dragging the tip of his forefinger down Kylo’s length until it hooks into the opening of his pants, tugging down on them lightly to free his balls. Kylo leans forward to close his lips over Hux’s neck, hot and perfect and wet with the barest hint of teeth. It makes Hux’s fingers squeeze convulsively; Kylo breathes out against his collarbone, shakily.

He needs Kylo to forget about Snoke, wants to fill the space in his head Snoke occupied so completely that Hux is all Kylo sees when he closes his eyes. He feels possessive, irrational about it, and just aroused enough to not want to pay too close attention to anything going on in his head right now. Even his need to bathe in the river shifts to a small space in the back of his mind, present, but presently unimportant.

It’s rough without anything to slick Hux’s fingers, so he keeps his movements small, tugging just lightly on the base of Kylo’s cock with one hand. Kylo’s hands travel over Hux’s body, drifting over his shoulders, elbows, pressing onto his hips before sliding up his back and into his hair. He doesn’t seem to know quite what to do with them, until they suddenly appear at his sides again, and now he’s struggling with Hux’s shirt impatiently, tugging on it until Hux lets go and lifts his arms so Kylo can tear it, and the undershirt, over his head. Two of the buttons sheer off and clatter to the pebbles, which should annoy Hux. It doesn’t. His dog tags slide back into place over his chest with a clink.

Once he’s free, Hux goes straight for the open wound on Kylo’s shoulder, the red tear angry and spotted with blood in startling contrast with the pale expanse of skin. He fits his mouth over the burn and presses his tongue against it, dragging it all the way up along its length. The taste makes Hux’s cock twitch, his hips dipping down to press against Kylo’s thigh. Kylo hisses through his teeth, digging the fingers of one hand into Hux’s waist.

Hux pushes Kylo back onto the pebbles, shifting down to rest on his thighs so he can tug his breeches down over his waist. Then he leans up, shifting his weight onto his knees and bracing his hands on both sides of Kylo’s face to look down at him. Kylo's hair spreads out around his head like a halo of soft black curls; his eyes are dark, peering up at Hux with a kind of soft vulnerability Hux is starting to suspect he hides behind that infernal mask of his more often than not.

“Say you'll help me kill Snoke,” Hux tries, because Kylo seems pliant beneath him, and not even the powerful shift of his thighs beneath Hux’s weight can distract him from the fast-ticking hours until dawn, quickly approaching, no time left for doubt. 

Kylo doesn't reply, and pulls him down instead for another kiss. Hux wants more, moves lower, trailing his lips down his chin and over his chest, flowing into the depression between his ribs and cresting over a hip bone. A trail of dark fuzz leads Hux down below his navel and there it is. The heat of his cock, a long, thick brand against Hux’s cheek. After a second of deliberation, he takes the head of his cock into his mouth. 

“Holy shit,” he hears Kylo exclaim, softly, and looks up to meet his eyes as he slides his lips slowly down, taking him into the back of his throat. He’ll admit sucking dick has never even made it onto the list of sexual escapades he’s been willing to consider, because he’s never exactly had a good relationship with bodily fluids of any kind. But something about Kylo makes him want to try it, makes him curious about the taste of him, the texture of him against his lips.

It doesn’t disappoint.

There’s more of him than Hux will ever be able to fit in his mouth, so he drags back up again, letting his teeth scrape lightly against the underside of his length, before pulling away from the tip with an obscene sucking sound.

“Say you'll help me kill Snoke?” he tries again, hopefully, fingers lightly curled around the base of Kylo’s cock. Kylo’s face is flushed, two red spots flaming on his cheeks, and his lip looks raw where he’s been biting it. It’s a good look for him. He ignores Hux, reaching up to put a large palm on the top of his head and pushing him down towards his cock again. Hux goes, because he’s really actually kind of enjoying this, despite his initial reservations.

His lips stretch wide enough around his cock to burn, and he stops about halfway down before he can gag. His breathing is rapid and shallow, his own cock aching. Kylo’s hand fists in his hair and pulls, painfully, and Hux goes up with it before being pushed down again. He lets Kylo control his movements, drool and precome dribbling through his lips and pooling in Kylo’s crotch, until his throat is almost numb, his tongue burning against his teeth.

And under any other circumstances, he would be disgusted. But now, here... The way Kylo seems to be falling apart under him, the movement of his hand staggering on Hux’s head, his power rolling over him in tiny, shivering shockwaves. This, he just finds arousing. 

Lifting a hand to push Kylo’s away, he slides his lips off his cock, sitting up and wiping his mouth on the back of his wrist. Kylo’s cock glistens, covered in spit and jutting out from his hips at an angle, twitching as Hux drags his eyes over it. Kylo makes this kind of soft, keening sound, weak and small and everything  _ not _ Kylo Ren, and it goes straight to Hux’s cock, which is straining so hard against his jodphurs he thinks it might tear them open.

“Say you’ll help me kill Snoke,” Hux says again, more earnestly.

Kylo doesn’t answer, so he leans up over him, their faces so close he can feel Kylo’s breath, and grabs his balls, squeezing as hard as he dares, his eyes glued to Kylo’s. “Say it.”

“Okay, yes,” Kylo pants out, his voice deeper than usual and rough, squeezing his eyes shut and furrowing his brow, “I’ll help you kill Snoke. God damn it, Hux, I’ll help you. Just don’t stop.”

Hux, who has never been above using sex as a tool of manipulation, smiles triumphantly, the last piece of the puzzle of Snoke’s destruction falling into place with the weight of a guillotine blade. He shimmies down Kylo’s chest again to sit on his knees, squeezing the base of his cock with one hand and taking him into his mouth, bobbing his head up and down quickly, hard, not giving Kylo a moment to recover, and it doesn’t take very long at all before Kylo shouts wordlessly, fingers tangling in Hux’s hair. Hux pulls away quickly, because as much as he’ll grudgingly admit he enjoyed sucking him off, he is not quite ready to have any kind of come in his mouth.

Kylo is panting, sweat sheening his brow, his eyes squeezed shut under a frown. Come is splattered in white streaks over his stomach, oozing into the grooves of the bandages on his side and dripping to the ground. He looks almost like he’s in pain, or pleasure so vast it might as well be pain. His hand is a heavy weight on Hux’s head, still grasping his hair, until it pulls him up roughly for a kiss. Hux goes, stumbling a bit until he can brace himself on one hand. He closes his eyes into the kiss.

_ “God, Hux,” _ whispers a voice inside his head, “ _ God” _ . 

Well, it’s nice to be appreciated. But he’s still hard enough to hurt, and if he doesn’t do something about it soon it’s going to end in a very embarrassing way for him. Especially because Kylo still doesn’t seem to have learned how to kiss without trying to suck his soul right out of his body.

Kylo rolls them to the side, the pebbles of the riverbed cutting into Hux’s arm and hip painfully as he squirms to get his jodphurs off, shoving them down to his ankles while trying not to break contact with Kylo’s lips. He’s about to reach down to take care of himself when Kylo breaks the kiss, sitting up and lifting Hux bodily by the waist to sit him down in his lap. The sudden inertia makes Hux grab for his arm, holding onto his shoulder and giving him a questioning look, but Kylo’s eyes are focused downward, on Hux’s cock. He holds a hand out, letting it hover a few inches from Hux’s crotch. 

The Force presses down on him. Not this again.

“No,” Hux says quickly, batting his hand away, “No Force near my crotch area. Remember?”

“Shut up, Hux,” Kylo says, his hand and the slight pressure of the Force returning. “Just let me try this.”

“Try?” Hux replies, alarmed, all kinds of wild scenarios flashing through his head, not the least frightening of which involve Kylo accidentally ripping his dick off with the Force. “What do you mean, ‘try’?”

“I mean, I just came up with this idea a moment ago, so let me try it.”

The Force squeezes down on Hux’s cock from all sides, and he loses whatever reply he may have had in a kind of low wheeze, because, god  _ damn _ . The slow, building pressure is constant and unrelenting, continuously squeezing down on him until his vision starts to blur around the edges with pleasure, his entire being narrowing down to that one point where Kylo is pushing, pushing, from all sides, squeezing and constricting and pressuring until Hux feels like exploding, his nails scraping long, angry red marks over Kylo’s arms as he comes with a loud shout.

Panting, he slumps forward to rest his head on Kylo’s shoulder, his mind a blank white slate, trying to figure out where his thoughts went.

The last orange slice of the sun disappears behind the thick fog blanketing the horizon, the sounds of the forest slowly lulling into a subdued, steady chorus of crickets and frogs. Hux catches his breath slowly, a heavy breeze cooling the sweat on his back. Thunder rumbles in the distance. It will probably rain again soon. When he feels his thought processes starting to return to normal, he lifts his head off Kylo’s shoulder. 

Exhaustion makes his limbs feel heavy, and he knows he should get up, go to the river to clean up, then get back to the shuttle to prepare for his assault on the Citadel. But all he wants to do right now is sleep. He pulls his pants back up, leaving them unfastened, sighs softly, eyeing the cobbled riverbank in distaste. His back still aches from where the pebbles ground into him, buried under Kylo’s weight the day before. He’d rather not lie on them again, so he pushes at Kylo’s shoulder until he sinks down and Hux can sprawl on top of him, his body hard, but warm and pliant beneath Hux.

He shifts around a bit until his body sinks into perfect alignment with Kylo’s, trying very hard to ignore the sticky-slippery mess of both their come smearing over his stomach. He thinks his hip might be digging into the wound on Kylo’s side, but he’s comfortable and too lazy to move, and Kylo doesn’t protest, so he stays where he is. Kylo’s fingers spiderweb lightly over his shoulder, up and down, up and down, a faraway look in his eyes.

Hux is loathe to admit it, but it’s downright cozy here on top of Kylo Ren; it’s the most comfortable he’s been in a long time, and his exhaustion is starting to creep up on him again, dulling the edges of his mind with a thin, grey veil.

“How?” Kylo breaks the silence that settled between them.

“How what?” Hux murmurs, annoyed at having to rouse himself out of the half-doze he’s fallen into.

Kylo pulls his hand away from Hux, tilting his chin down a bit to look at him. “How will we attack the Citadel? What’s your strategy?”

Hux closes his eyes, fighting a yawn, and simply says, “Bombs.” 

“... Bombs?”

When it becomes clear Kylo isn’t going to quiet down, Hux lifts his head, resting his chin on Kylo’s pectoral to look up at him. “Bombs secured to the trees at the path entrance. Bombs explode, trees collapse, access gets blocked. No Stormtroopers to fight us off, at least for a while.”

Kylo is quiet for a long time, carefully not meeting Hux’s eyes. The silence begins to grate on Hux’s nerves; he’s absolutely sure it means Kylo is coming up with a way to insult his strategy.

“It’s just,” he begins, and Hux frowns preemptively, “You’re one of the most renowned military strategists the Order has ever seen, and that’s what you come up with? ‘Bomb the trees’?”

There it is.

“I don’t see what the problem is,” Hux says, testily, leaning up and resting his arms on Kylo’s chest to look at him properly. “The simplest solution is often the most effective one.”

Kylo scrunches his face, looking like he’s about to say something, but when he meets Hux’s eyes he sags back, perhaps changing his mind. “Well. It’s definitely… dramatic.” he decides.

“Says the one who keeps a big tub full of his enemy’s ashes on the Finalizer,” Hux points out.

Kylo considers this. “Fair enough.”

There’s something amusing about the way he says this, and it takes some of the edge off Hux’s irritation. He’s still tired, anyway, so he lies down again, resting his chin on Kylo’s collarbone and staring into the scar on his cheek. And while they’re on the topic of their upcoming coup: “I need you to distract Snoke’s guards while I set the bombs.”

Kylo makes a face, shaking his head. “Ah, yeah, no. Pass on the distracting. Let me set the bombs instead.”

“They’re  _ my _ bombs.” Hux counters, then squeezes his eyes shut when he hears how childish this sounds. Kylo never fails to bring out this instinctively defensive side of him.

“What I mean,” he backtracks, “is that I designed them. Only I know how the trigger mechanism works.” Not entirely true, since XN-336 helped with the construction of said bombs. But Kylo doesn't need to know this. 

“Okay. But you should know I’ve been consistently proven to do better with destruction than obstruction.” Kylo says, and, actually, he has a point. However.

“I was there the last time Kylo Ren was around explosives of any sort,” Hux answers, bitterly, “And as I recall it ended in an entire planet imploding on itself.”

“Not my fault,” Kylo sulks. “Anyway, what would I even distract them with? They’re Stormtroopers.”

Hux raises an eyebrow at this. “I’m sure you’ll come up with something.”

“Fine.” Kylo kind of sniffs, letting his head rest back against the rocks. Hux waits for a second to see if he’ll say anything else, then lies his cheek on Kylo’s chest when it appears not. He’s just starting to drift off again when Kylo speaks up once more.

“Block the path. Storm the Citadel.”

Hux sighs.

“Kill the… Kill the Knights.” Kylo’s voice is soft, deep. 

Hux doesn’t look at him, staring off into the distance but not really seeing anything. “Is that going to be a problem?”

Kylo’s quiet long enough that Hux thinks he might not answer. Then he hums, the sound low enough to vibrate through his chest and up into Hux’s body. “I’m not sure,” he says tentatively. At least he’s honest. Hux rolls his eyes a bit, turning his head to look up at him.

“We’re… not friends,” Kylo’s saying, “but they’re loyal to me. They’ve saved my life a few times. But I can’t talk to them like I can to you.”

Hux blinks. As far as he can recall, the longest conversation they’ve had to date lasted exactly five minutes, and mostly consisted of Hux finding new and inventive ways to vent his anger on Kylo without downright resorting to name-calling. He may or may not have insulted his lineage, particularly the part of it sitting in a small, sad lump of charred steel in Kylo’s chambers, which may or may not have led to the destruction of Hux’s command chair by lightsaber. A Stormtrooper lost a hand. It was all very dramatic.

Hux doesn’t mention any of this, turning away from Kylo with a confused frown. “We can’t allow the Knights to live, Kylo,” he says instead, trying to find his footing again, “You know they’ll come after us for killing Snoke.”

“...Yeah,” Kylo accedes softly, Hux rising up and lowering down with his chest as he sighs deeply. “I mean. They belong to him.”

“Can they use the Force?” Hux asks, suddenly remembering Skullface Ren’s anecdote about Icarus. Just remembering the way he said it makes Hux shift uncomfortably; like he knew something Hux didn’t, or knew something Hux knew he shouldn’t.

Kylo shakes his head, his hand wandering back to Hux’s shoulder absently. “No. Not in any of the ways that count. But they’re highly intuitive, perceptive in ways that border on preternatural. And connected to me, in a way I can’t explain. We... feel each other. In a way we  _ are _ each other.”

Hux doesn’t even begin to understand this, and finds it eerie in a way that makes his skin crawl. He fights the urge to shiver.

“So they’ll know, then. About Snoke. They already know.”

Kylo shakes his head again. “They don’t, Hux. Trust me.”

Hux doesn’t. He finds nothing about this comforting at all. He can’t shake the feeling that the Knights do, in fact, know something at least, if not in detail. If they arrive at the Citadel to find the Knights waiting for them, ready to attack before they even set the bombs, he’ll have to trust Kylo to take care of them. And as much as he can still taste his cock on his tongue, trusting him is still something Hux finds difficult. He’ll have to come up with a contingency. Just in case.

“So,” says Kylo, “Kill four Knights of Ren. Kill twenty Stormtroopers. Kill Supreme Leader Snoke. That’s all.”

“Piece of cake.” Hux murmurs, wishing he felt as confident about this as he sounds. He frowns into the treeline, unease eating a tiny hole in his chest. The moons have started to peek over the horizon, two silver, pockmarked crescents embracing the twinned shadow of the planet. The enormity of what Hux is planning to do sinks to the pit of his stomach, heavy as a rock, his mood sinking with it. 

Kylo must read this off him, because he says, “You’re… scared.” There’s a pause, which he quickly fills when Hux turns to glare at him. “Maybe not scared. Worried.”

“I have a healthy concern for my own personal safety, yes.” Hux hedges. “And what we’re planning to do tomorrow is certainly not very safe.” 

Kylo seems to accept this, resting his head back. Hux closes his eyes, taking a deep breath and sighing it out, feeling his body grow heavier on top of Kylo’s, and as the silence stretches on, he finds himself starting to sink into a light doze despite the continuing sense of disquiet lurking in the back of his head, the pleasant warmth of Kylo’s body slowly relaxing the tenseness in his muscles.

“Question.” Kylo says. Hux’s eyes snap open.

“Yes?” he bites out.

Kylo lifts his head to look down at him. Hux glares up at him, trying to project the idea that he could still use Kylo’s corpse as a pillow after murdering him into Kylo’s head.

Kylo seems unfazed. “How will we escape from the Citadel if we’ve blown up the only exit?”

At least it’s actually a valid question. One Hux already has covered. “Leave that to me.”

This seems to placate Kylo, who rests his head back on the stones again, allowing Hux to shift into a more comfortable position on top of him and close his eyes. It seems like Kylo will finally allow him some peace, his hand lifting away from Hux’s arm and wandering to his back, brushing his knuckles lightly over his skin, so Hux allows himself to drift, his mind running over his strategy for the attack on Snoke over and over again until the world finally fades around him.


	8. Got 99 problems but Snoke ain’t one

Hux doesn’t dream.

He’s woken some time before dawn by the almost painful pinprick of surprisingly cold droplets of rain on his back. It’s too early yet for birds, the purple blue of night shrouded to almost perfect blackness by the thick layer of clouds overhead. He shivers, going to sit up, but finds himself trapped under Kylo’s arm, resting heavily over his back. 

Kylo is out cold, head lolling to one side and lips slightly parted in sleep. And Hux is actually kind of loath to move, because Kylo is really more comfortable than he’d care to admit, but the rain is really cold and he can still feel come sticking their skin together lower down, and his need to clean up by far outweighs this temporary comfort.

So he squirms, eventually reaching back and dislodging the heavy arm before sitting up and casting around for his clothes. They are, of course, drenched, as is the clean Stormtrooper under-gear he’d left on the log earlier. Hux sighs heavily, running a hand through his hair. Because the only thing that could possibly make a pre-dawn assassination attempt on the Supreme Leader of the First Order more fun would be doing so in cold, wet clothes.

Hux mutters to himself, getting up and padding over the pebbles to the river. The cold should, by all reasoning, be a welcome respite from the incessant, pressing heat and humidity of the planet, but apparently seasons don’t happen in half-measures here, and by the time he reaches the river, he’s hugging himself for warmth. The water is like ice, almost cold enough to burn, and a deep ache settles into his muscles as he scoops water into his palms, scrubbing down his body as best he can. He ducks his head underwater for as long as he can stand, his ears panging, then shakes the water from his hair and wades back to shore, his whole body trembling. He took less time getting clean than he’d have liked, but he’s so cold his teeth have started chattering, and he physically can’t stand to be in the icy water any longer.

The Stormtrooper under-gear mocks him from the log, dripping slightly as he lifts it up to stare at it in distaste. The black pullover is freezing where he pulls it over his head, the cold material clinging to his arms and chest like a sheet of ice. His whole body shivers as he tugs on the loose black pants, cursing in every language he knows at the socks that squelch lightly as he walks back to Kylo to fetch his boots.

Kylo’s awake now, leaning up on his elbows to watch him approach. His eyes slide over Hux’s body in a positively lewd way. Hux scowls at him, hugging himself again for warmth. “What are you looking at?”

Kylo’s mouth twists into a half-smile. “You. Come here.” He holds out an arm.

“We don’t have time. It’ll be dawn soon.” Hux grabs his boots, hopping slightly as he fumbles with tugging them on one by one, angrily.

“Just. Shut up and come here.” Kylo gestures towards him again, and lying there, naked in the rain, his hair plastered to his face in a way that Hux certainly, definitely, under no circumstances finds incredibly attractive, he really can’t refuse. So he goes over, sitting down next to Kylo with a huff.

“We have to start preparing. If we strike before the Knights wake up, it gives us the element of surprise, and our best chance at…” he trails off, poking Kylo’s shoulder lightly. “Are you even listening to me?”

Kylo puts an arm around him, pulling him close, and a sudden warmth blooms over Hux, drenching him as thoroughly as the rain and cold river water. It seeps into every muscle, burrowing deep inside of him until his body slowly relaxes, his shivering subsiding into a deep sense of calm. Hux turns to scowl at Kylo even as he absently shifts a bit closer to him. He is most certainly not burrowing in under his arm. Alright, maybe only a little. 

“Where the hell were you during my speech on Starkiller Base? I thought I was going to lose a few fingers to frostbite that day.”

Kylo’s face twitches slightly into that half-smirk of his, his eyes sliding off Hux and back to the river. “As much as I enjoy the sight of your shirt clinging to you like that, I can’t let you catch your death.”

And, again, Hux wonders what kind of bizarre alternate world he’s been transported to where getting hit on by Kylo Ren while all but basically snuggling against his side is something that is even remotely in the realm of possibility. If someone told him one week ago he’d actually enjoy being this close to him, he’d have laughed in their face before issuing an official reprimand and taking disciplinary measures. But here he is, practically nestled into the crook of Kylo’s arm, and god fucking damn if he doesn’t find it downright pleasant.

He scrubs his hands over his face, trying to rid himself of the last lingering cobwebs of exhaustion stubbornly clinging to his mind. Stubble scrapes the skin of his palms, making him wince. He must look a wreck; it’s been days since he last shaved, and with this planet’s constant humidity and distinct lack of any kind of hair products, he’s sure his hair must be a disheveled mess. 

Kylo, of course, looks exactly the same as he always does, because apparently the Force does everything except fucking stop the seven signs of aging. Hux thinks a particularly vicious curse in his direction. 

They sit like that, in silence, for a long time, until the rain peters down into a light drizzle and the violet glimmer of dawn breaks through the clouds. The first tentative twitters of birdsong pull Hux from the almost-doze he’s fallen into. It’s time. He pulls away from Kylo, getting to his feet slowly and tugging the sleeves of his shirt down over his hands. His clothes are almost dry, by some miracle, and mostly tolerable. He’s too tired to be surprised by anything having to do with the Force anymore.

He looks down at Kylo, shifting his weight and inclining his head towards the path, back in the direction of the clearing. Time to go.

Kylo meets his eyes, then looks away with a deep sigh, hugging his knees to his chest. Hux thinks he might be about to protest, to change his mind and say he won’t help him after all. He has a kind of sad, confused look on his face; a kind of heavy set to his shoulders. But he doesn’t say anything, and doesn’t meet Hux’s gaze as he inclines his head, once, unfolding and getting to his feet. He stretches out, the muscles in his back and hips rippling around a brief show of ribs, undulating in his side.

“Wait for me where you plan to set the bombs.” he says over his shoulder, and Hux snaps his eyes back up to his face as though burned. Kylo’s lips press into a half smile, lacking any real mirth, before he turns his back on Hux and walks towards the river.

Hux watches him until he wades into the water - wants to stay and watch longer - but the cold, blue light of dawn is calling, and a brand new day is about to start, so he turns his back on Kylo Ren and heads back towards the clearing.

It's still dark enough that no light penetrates the forest path, and he has to make his way to the campsite by a combination of memory and feeling his way along the trees with both hands stretched out to the sides. It’s slow going, and by the time he reaches the clearing, the blueish pre-dawn light has started to tint towards orange-pink. 

The campsite is quiet, except for one white-clad Stormtrooper on the perimeter of the clearing, staring off into the forest with his rifle cradled in an elbow. Somewhere in the trees, something with teeth lets out a single, keening howl. It sends shivers up Hux’s arms, and he hurries a bit towards the shuttle, jogging up the ramp and tapping in the code to open the airlock. The doors hiss open to reveal the black maw of the hull and he ducks inside, setting the lights to a low percentage with the little data pad to the left of the doors.

On the metal bench bolted to the wall sit his hat, gloves and greatcoat, neatly folded on top of a ration box. Hux side-eyes the box, walking over slowly. Surely not…

Lifting his clothes, he tips open the lid of the box to reveal that, yes, XN-336 did in fact think it a good enough place to hide their bombs. Well. Alright. Hux doesn't know any Stormtrooper that would dare touch his greatcoat, so it makes a kind of sense, actually.

He pushes the lid of the box aside, picking up his hat and squashing it down over his unruly hair. The greatcoat slides on like a suit of armor; even over Stormtrooper under-gear it settles onto his shoulders with all the weight of the Order’s authority, and when he slips his gloves onto his hands he finally starts to feel like his old self again, the downright bizarreness of the past few days settling into nothing but a completely ridiculous, if at times pleasantly so, memory.

The bombs from the box go into the pockets of his greatcoat, two on each side. Carefully. He makes sure the triggers face away from each other, keeping his hands on top of them inside his pockets to keep them steady. And then he's ready.

He takes a deep breath, steeling himself before slipping out of the shuttle and down the ramp. The Stormtrooper sentry half turns towards him, alerted by the metallic thud of Hux’s boots, and raises his blaster rifle in salute. Hux just nods curtly at him, hurrying through the campsite and trying not to dwell on the fact that he might have to put a blaster bolt through him at some point today.

He rushes along the path to the Citadel. It’s quiet under the canopy of trees today, stifling and heavy with cold, and for the first time since their arrival on this planet, Hux is glad for his greatcoat, all but huddling into its warm, wool collar as he clambers over a particularly enthusiastic tree root. The grenades are slightly warm under his hands.

Kylo is waiting for him at the end of the path, a quiet and hulking shadow outlined against the faint light emanating from the clearing. His lightsaber is sheathed, cold and dark at his side, and he doesn’t seem to be engaged in combat with anyone, so Hux assumes the Knights of Ren didn’t sense their approach and set a trap for them. That, or Kylo has decided to align himself with them and is waiting for Hux to arrive so he can kill him himself. Hux stomps on that little idea squirming in the back of his head. A good leader trusts his troops above all. Trust is important. He can trust Kylo. He keeps repeating that until he reaches Kylo’s side.

Kylo is wearing his new uniform, with the addition of a kind of long, black scarf wrapped around his head and the bottom of his face. It trails down to his calves in the back, a bit bedraggled and torn. Hux finds himself wanting to ask where the hell Kylo keeps finding new clothes when the closest Hux has seen to any kind of storage on this planet is the boxes of rations and camping gear the ‘troopers brought with them.

“Are you ready for this?” he asks instead, softly.

Kylo inclines his head, taking a deep breath. “As ready as I'll ever be.” 

Hux peers out into the clearing, confirming his guess that there are no Knights of Ren waiting for them. In fact, there’s hardly any movement at all except for the two black-clad ‘troopers guarding the doors. But Hux is too tense to feel relieved; there’s still a chance the Knights could be waiting in ambush, ready to fall on them at any moment.

Kylo’s hand is curled loosely around his ‘saber, fingers flexing convulsively with nervous tension, and the scar on his face is twisted around a frown. For a fleeting moment, Hux considers kissing him, maybe for good luck or positive reinforcement or because he actually sincerely just feels like it. But Kylo drags the scarf up around his mouth and jaw before Hux can move, already halfway out into the clearing.

Hux hangs back, pressing himself up against the thick stem of a tall fern to watch Kylo stalk with his usual sort of stomping walk up to the Stormtroopers guarding the doors. The ‘troopers watch him approach a bit apprehensively, glancing at each other when he comes to a standstill in front of them. 

There’s a short silence. Kylo’s hunched over slightly, his fists clenched. Towering over both ‘troopers with the tattered scarf wound around his jaw doing absolutely nothing to hide the bloody scar splitting open his face, he looks positively menacing. The Stormtroopers glance at each other again, the one on the left shuffling slightly.

“Hello.” Kylo says, making the ‘trooper on the right jump a bit, “It’s me, Kylo Ren.”

Hux suppresses the urge to groan, pressing a hand to his forehead. Out of all the people in the universe Snoke could have chosen to be his prodigy, he chose Kylo Ren. Compared to this, Hux suddenly finds his own life choices thus far pale in comparison on the scale of sheer ridiculousness. 

Shaking his head, he decides to leave Kylo to it. Whatever “it” may be. He should probably get done setting the bombs sooner than later, and doesn’t hang around to hear the rest of Kylo’s disastrous attempt at distraction.

With the lack of any kind of adhesive to stick the grenades to the bark of the trees, Hux levers them in between branches, twisted into looping curls of vines, or propped carefully against the bottom of the tall, gently waving ferns. The rough surface of the trees’ bark scratches under his gloves, fragments of wood clinging to the leather as he clambers over branches and roots.

He’s about to squeeze the last bomb in behind an annoyingly yellow flower as large as his head when something makes him pause. They’re about to walk into a very dangerous situation, and though he is confident in his strategy, if there’s one thing his time in the military has taught him, it’s that, in the heat of battle, anything that possibly can go wrong, probably will. Also, that there is no such thing as overkill where ordinance is concerned.

And there’s still a very tiny part of him that doesn’t entirely trust Kylo Ren.

He hesitates a moment longer, then slips the last bomb back into the pocket of his greatcoat. 

A tiny, plastic seal sits on the lip of every bomb, and Hux breaks these in quick succession, starting the chain reaction that will lead to the fusion and eventual combustion of fuel and plasma. Ten seconds. He starts a mental countdown in his head, pushing a large fern leaf aside to hurry back into the Citadel clearing. 

He finds Kylo standing over a jumbled heap of black ‘trooper armour that may or may not have contained Snoke’s guards, his lightsaber flickering out. Hux half jogs over to him, raising an eyebrow at the Stormtroopers. “This is your definition of a distraction?”

Kylo looks at the Stormtroopers, then at Hux, sheathing his lightsaber. “I don’t know. They seem pretty distracted to me.”

Hux is about to respond with something snide when the first bomb explodes. He flinches, raising both arms to cover his head, a blast of heat surging over them both. The remaining two grenades go off in short succession, the explosions stronger than he bargained for. Shards of bark, leaves and vines spit out into the clearing, a mass of projectiles hurtling towards them. Kylo flings his hand out and the debris clatters against something just short of hitting Hux, an invisible, faintly-humming wall fencing them both off from the blast.

The bombs served their purpose. The trees around the path are completely destroyed, a rubble of timber and burning leaves piled as tall as two men completely blocking the opening that used to be the path, sending a tall spire of grey smoke spiraling slowly into the sky.

Hux lowers his arms slightly, staring at the quickly fading Force shield before craning his head back to look at Kylo, who just kind of shrugs awkwardly.

There isn’t time for words. The doors to the Citadel slam open, all four Knights of Ren pouring out. Their weapons are drawn and their postures tense, ready for a fight. They unanimously come to a halt just in front of the doors, glancing around the clearing in confusion, first at the smoking pile of ruined flora at the mouth of the path, then at the fallen Stormtroopers, then at Hux and Kylo.

“What is this?” Blaster Ren demands, her handblaster dipping slightly as she hesitates.

“I’m sorry,” Kylo answers softly, hand coming to rest on the hilt of his lightsaber. 

Four silver-gilded masks turn as one to look at him, and Hux feels that same kind of low buzzing right at the base of his skull, which, he decides, is definitely them communicating somehow. It makes the hair on the back of his neck stand up.

“Don’t do this, Kylo,” says Bombs Ren, unclipping the clasp of the leather strap crossing over his chest, from which approximately ten small grenades dangle loosely. He nods at Hux, sliding one grenade off the strip of leather, and says, “We expected this from him. But you can still make the smart choice here.” 

All of the Knights’ masks turn slowly to stare at Hux. Kylo kind of looks back at him too, over his shoulder, his hair covering his face.

“We’ve always been here for you, Kylo,” intones Scimitar Ren, and Hux abstractly notices his voice sounds exactly like Bombs’. From their similar build and posture, Hux wonders if they’re identical twins.

“We’re your family. Not him,” says Skullface Ren. And at this, Kylo’s shoulders slump slightly, drawing in on himself.

“You don’t need to do this. Come back to us,” finishes Blaster Ren. And now Kylo’s turning towards Hux, his lightsaber crackling to life. Hux stares, incredulously, frozen in place under the sheer enormity of his own mistake. Of course Kylo would never choose him. He’s passionately fanatic and terrifyingly devoted to Snoke, and the Knights of Ren are his to command. Hux feels the vision he had of ruling the galaxy with Kylo at his side crumble around him. Stupid. He was so stupid. 

Kylo takes a step toward him, his eyes dark and unreadable, the red glow from the crackling, spitting lightsaber drawing bright red lightning streaks over his face. Hux curses himself for rushing into this. He should have taken more time, planned it more carefully. He finds himself scrambling for his blaster, but it’s as if time has slowed down and he’s moving through thick mud, dragging at his hand.

He’s failed.

“I’m sorry,” Kylo says again, looking at Hux. Hux isn’t going to make it. Kylo’s right on top of him, the lightsaber raised above his head. He swings---

\---and spins around, completing the lightsaber’s arc by slicing neatly through the leather strap containing all of Bombs Ren’s grenades. The strap snaps open over a deep, smoking slice through his armour, bombs cascading to the ground. The Knights’ masks whip around to stare at him in shock. Hux does the mental equivalent of picking his jaw up from the floor, time snapping back into its normal pace as he finishes unholstering his blaster and levels it somewhere between Kylo and the Knights, still not entirely sure what’s going on.

“Stop staring like an imbecile and shoot something, Hux!” Kylo flings over his shoulder, and reflex takes over. He fires off a few shots towards the twins as Kylo launches himself at Blaster and Skullface Ren, and from the way he tears into them it’s clear to Hux that he means to end their lives. Bombs Ren is in the fray in a second, lashing out with fists and feet where he can slip inside Kylo’s reach.

Scimitar Ren veers away from the others to bear down on Hux, the weapon Hux adopted for his name twirling in wide, dangerous sweeps. He’s on Hux in a fraction of a second, and it’s all Hux can do to duck and weave to avoid the curved sword, the long blade moving much faster than something of that reach should be able to. His greatcoat tangles around his legs as he darts back, tripping him up, but as he stumbles, the scathing edge of the scimitar whistles through the space his head occupied just a moment ago. He blinks as a few fine strands of his own fiery red hair drift past his face, then has to fling himself to the side, rolling away from the whoosh of the sword as it arcs right past his ear. How the fuck is Scimitar so fast?

In the background, he can briefly make out Kylo flinging one Knight back with the Force while deflecting blaster shots with his lightsaber, the glowing red beam of it blurring into tightly controlled spins too fast to see.

Then Hux is rolling again, into a slightly awkward backward flip that finally manages to get him far enough out of Scimitar’s reach to raise his handblaster. He lands in a crouch and fires off a few bolts in rapid succession. Most of them miss, but one glances off the Knight’s shoulder. He curses, his arm faltering, and it’s all the distraction Hux needs. He surges up, grabbing the butt of the blaster with his other hand to steady it and walking towards Scimitar, squeezing the trigger as fast as he can and firing as many shots at the still-moving Knight as he can manage in the spirit of ‘one of them is bound to hit something vital’. 

One does.

Scimitar flies backward, twisting dramatically in mid-air before crumpling to the ground, blood seeping from the gaping hole in the side of his helmet. Hux realizes he’s been holding his breath, and takes a deep gulp of air, lowering the blaster but keeping his double-handed grip on it. He inches towards Scimitar Ren, reaching out with the toe of his boot to prod at his shoulder lightly. No reaction.

Relief floods through him, mixing with the adrenaline in his blood and causing a wave of nausea to rush over him. It doesn’t last long. 

He flinches as a laser bolt hisses past his head. At first he thinks it’s Blaster Ren, but the direction of the shot is wrong: Blaster is still engaged with Kylo near the Citadel, and this shot came from behind Hux, towards the trees. He whirls around in time to see three of Snoke’s guard rushing towards them, black armour clattering as they peel out from behind the Citadel. Their blaster rifles are raised, blue and pink bolts searing through the air and tearing up the ground around Hux’s feet.

_ Shit shit shit shi--- _

He dives for cover, firing a few shots in the guards’ general direction before rolling in behind Scimitar’s corpse and dragging it up in front of him as a shield.  _ Where the fuck did they come from?  _ There weren’t supposed to be other guards in the clearing. It’s always just been the two at the door, Hux is sure of it.

He winces as blaster bolts thud into Scimitar’s body, pushing it back against him. He has to switch his blaster to his non-dominant right hand, lifting it from behind the corpse to fire a few more shots without really looking, having only more or less an idea which direction the ‘troopers are coming from. He gets lucky; one ‘trooper goes down. But the other two are almost on top of him. 

Something jabs into Hux’s stomach. He glances down to see the pommel of Scimitar’s sword jutting out from underneath his thigh, trapped beneath his body where it fell. He grabs the now mangled corpse’s shoulder with one hand, struggling to keep it in front of him as he tugs on the hilt. The corpse is heavy and the sword stuck at an awkward angle, catching on something on the other side of Scimitar’s body. Hux struggles with it, cursing loudly as he wrenches the hilt until managing, with great effort, to slide it out towards him.

With his blaster in the same hand he can barely get enough traction on the hilt to hold it, but somehow, he manages to jerk it upwards just in time to meet the waist of the first Stormtrooper to reach him. It slides through the rubber waist-joint of the black armour almost effortlessly, impaling the ‘trooper with a wet, gurgling sound. Hux has to let go of the sword as she sags to her knees, doubling over the blade. The hilt slides against the ground, dragging up against Scimitar’s thighs and propping the dead ‘trooper up in a kneeling position.

Blood rivulets down the blade, a long, red trail splintering Hux’s reflection in it.

The second ‘trooper is still firing at Hux, and one bolt hits true, fire searing into the top of his left shoulder. He hisses, dropping his handblaster and cringing down half under the dead ‘trooper. One hand flails behind him, struggling to make a grab for where the blaster has come to rest a few centimetres away. The other is raised up over his face, covering his head but leaving his chest frighteningly exposed. He snags the blaster just in time, firing madly at the Stormtrooper until he goes down in a heap, right at Scimitar’s feet, much too close for comfort. 

Hux presses a hand to his burning shoulder before pulling it away to inspect it. It comes away bloody. He makes a face, wiping his glove on Scimitar’s arm and getting to his feet. It doesn’t feel like the blaster bolt hit anything serious, but it hurts like hell, pain lancing down his arm and into his fingers. More importantly, blood is seeping from a neat, bolt-sized hole in the shoulder seam of his precious greatcoat, staining the First Order insignia. He growls at this, turning a glare on the fallen ‘trooper and kicking his body hard enough to flip it over.

The sounds of battle pull his attention to where Kylo is still fighting the Knights of Ren. He’s taken Bombs Ren down, but Skullface and Blaster Ren have him cornered with his back against the Citadel, ‘saber whirling and spinning so quickly all that’s visible of it is a red, glowing blur.

Hux can already hear shouts and commotion from the other side of the rubble-blocked path; the rest of the Stormtroopers, to the rescue. From the sounds of it, not only Snoke’s personal guard have come to see what all the noise is about. Most likely all of the Stormtroopers currently on this planet will be behind that rubble. Hux makes a face, transferring his handblaster to his right hand. His left arm is numb with pain, useless at gripping the blaster, so his weak hand will have to do. Taking aim, he sights along the narrow pin on the top slide of the blaster. He takes some time with the shot, because as much as he’s given serious thought to the idea of shooting Kylo Ren, actually doing so in the midst of trying to overthrow the leadership of the First Order might be slightly inconvenient for Hux.

He exhales, presses the trigger. Skullface Ren hits the ground almost violently, his body kind of imploding and crumpling in on itself. Blood bubbles from a smoking hole in his back, hemorrhaging over his cloak and spreading over the mossy ground. Blaster Ren kind of slides to a stop, her chest heaving, gun slowly sinking as she stares at him in horror. Kylo is looking at Hux agape, eyes wide, as if he’s surprised Hux can actually be useful in a fight.

Hux just rolls his eyes, gesturing towards the Citadel doors with his blaster. “Go! We have to go!” 

He leans down, holstering the blaster and scooping up one of the fallen Stormtroopers’ rifles, tossing the sling around his neck and nestling the grip in the pit of his right arm. It smears the blood from his shoulder over his chest.

Kylo lunges forward, taking advantage of Blaster Ren’s distraction to slash her right across the waist with his lightsaber. Her scream dies in a kind of gurgling moan as she drops to her knees, the handblaster Hux named her after thudding to the ground at her side. Kylo crouches down quickly to catch her shoulders, holding the ‘saber’s sputtering blade away from her as he lowers her to the ground slowly. As Hux jogs up to them he can hear him murmur, “I’m sorry.”

More blaster fire starts raining down on them from the pile of rubble blocking the path. Three white helmets peek over it, rifles resting on the rubble to shoot down on them from the summit.

“We have to go,” Hux pants at Kylo, leaning on one knee to catch his breath, his injured arm clutched to his chest. Sweat streams down the sides of his face. Kylo looks up at him, but doesn’t move. Two white-clad Stormtroopers have clambered over the debris and thump to the ground, running in their direction with rifles at the ready. 

“Ren, we have to go!” Hux yells at Kylo, flinging a hand in the direction of the Citadel.

Kylo crawls to his knees, pushing himself up on the hand still holding the ignited lightsaber. The bottom of his tunic is drenched in blood, dripping a trail of red as he runs with Hux towards the Citadel. They make it through the doors just as the Stormtroopers catch up to them.

A volley of blaster fire follows them inside, ricocheting off the walls and thudding into the broken brick and mortar, spitting up moss and bits of vine. Hux manages to shift his blaster rifle onto his hip as he runs, twisting back to return fire at the ‘troopers. Beside him, Kylo’s lightsaber flashes in wide arcs, deflecting blaster bolts with loud, electric cracks. They back slowly into the lobby, suddenly dim and dark after the bright morning light outside, Kylo acting as a shield while Hux returns fire. The ‘troopers duck out behind the doorway, leaning inside to fire a few shots when Hux stops shooting long enough to run.

The Knights’ campsite is in shambles, holosail tents shredded to pieces and ration boxes blasted to bits, impersonal and empty remnants of four lives erased from the world. 

It’s slow progress, but they eventually make it through the archway and into the corridor that leads to Snoke’s chambers. Hux flattens his back against the wall, gasping for breath as he checks the rifle’s ammunition counter. The plasma count is low; he’s not giving it enough time to regenerate between shots. It maybe has three charges left. 

He’s in the process of tugging the sling over his head to discard the rifle when Kylo grabs a handful of the back of his coat, dragging him deeper into the corridor. He stumbles, fighting to keep upright, the rifle flailing as his arm windmills for balance.

“What are you---” he starts, but Kylo cuts him off.

“Cover me.” 

Hux frowns at him, indignity flaring for a second as he rails against being ordered around like a dog. But Kylo has his eyes closed, this kind of intense look of concentration on his face, so Hux bites back his retort and sinks into a crouch, rifle at the ready. The remaining three discharges don’t last him very long, every flash of a white Stormtrooper helmet met with a bright blue laser bolt. Before long the rifle sputters out, making a pathetic, whirring moan as it tries to cycle plasma that isn’t there. He slings it around to rest on his back, grabbing his handblaster from the holster at his thigh instead. His aim is worse with his right hand, shots ricocheting off the doors and walls and thudding into the floor, but it keeps the Stormtroopers at bay.

Slightly behind him, Kylo has one arm raised, a deep frown of concentration twisting his face. Hux is just about to yell at him to stop messing around when he feels the ground start to shake. He pauses in his volley, lowering his blaster slightly and looking around the corridor. Dust and leaves rain down on them as the shaking increases, the walls vibrating, then shaking hard enough to dislodge tiny pieces of stone and mortar.

Hux reaches out to lean his hand against the wall for balance. Outside, the Stormtroopers exclaim in surprise, armour clacking as they stumble to the sides and into each other.

Kylo’s fist clenches slowly, and with it, the shaking increases to a proper quake, a deep groaning roar coming from somewhere deep inside the stone walls. And when he wrenches his arm down in a wide arc, the ruined corridor ceiling comes with it, collapsing into a huge pile of stones and vines and shattered glass. The corridor is completely blocked, nothing of the entry hall visible anymore, no Stormtroopers and, even better, no blaster bolts.

Dust billows out slowly from the rubble and over them both, a kind of indistinct grey cloud breaking the sudden dark swallowing the corridor.

There’s a very long, deep silence after this, broken only by the spitting crackle of Kylo’s lightsaber. Hux turns his head slowly to stare at Kylo. Kylo is breathing hard, one hand pressed to the stone wall of the corridor tiredly. As Hux’s eyes adjust to the dim light, he can just make out a few feeble beams of sunlight breaking the darkness at the end of the corridor, near where Snoke’s chamber is. 

Hux gets up slowly, coughing from the dust and holstering his blaster, patting bits of mortar from the lapels of his coat and picking a stray leaf out of his fringe. “Well then. I suppose that’s one way to do it.”

He turns to look towards the end of the corridor, where the doors to Snoke’s chambers are lost to the settling dust. His shoulder is throbbing with every heartbeat, his arm numb and useless. Kylo straightens, turning to follow his gaze, and when Hux nods towards Snoke’s doors he starts forward, the red glow of his lightsaber lighting the way and bathing everything in an ominous shade of crimson.

When they reach Snoke’s chamber, Hux’s heart sinks. The doors are, naturally, sealed shut, heavy and impenetrable, built for the sole purpose of protecting the Supreme Leader from threats. He should have known Snoke would seal the doors and hide from them. But in all his calculations, he somehow forgot about these massive doors, if anything, more effective than all the Knights of Ren combined at keeping them from the Supreme Leader. Hux’s lips curl into a snarl.

“Fucking coward!” he spits, kicking the door hard enough to send a shock of pain up his ankle. He whirls and stalks away from it, lifting the heavy strap of the Stormtrooper rifle over his head and throwing the blaster against the opposite wall.

Kylo takes a step back, killing and sheathing his lightsaber as he takes a deep breath, visibly calming himself. He closes his eyes, holding up a hand in a familiar stance. Hux doesn’t know whether to laugh or scream. Bringing the rotting ceiling of an old, decrepit ruin down is one thing; the stones were probably loose enough to have collapsed at some point without any assistance at all. But Snoke’s doors are heavy, strong wood reinforced with steel, and if Hux is any kind of judge of these kinds of things it would take approximately an entire battalion of Stormtroopers with a battering ram to bring them down. 

“What do you think you’re doing, Ren?” he huffs out in an almost-laugh, sounding desperate and angry. He gestures at the doors wildly. “Last time I checked, you’re just a man, not an armored siege engine.” 

“Shut up,” Kylo says softly.

“It’s useless,” Hux says, throwing his hand up. He has the overwhelming urge to sit down and just wait for the Stormtroopers to break through the collapsed corridor and kill him, so he does, flinging his coat tails out behind him and flopping to the ground with a huff, because what point does any of this have if they can’t get to Snoke? Any moment now the Stormtroopers will break through and arrest him and Kylo, and they’ll face the First Order version of a dishonorable discharge, which is a rather worse fate than death.

But Kylo says, “Shut up, Hux,”, and frowns, tilting his head slightly to the side, his raised arm trembling, and as he does so, the very slightest sound of wood scraping over stone accompanies a light shower of dust from just overhead the doors.

Hux gets to his feet, staring at the door. It moved. It definitely moved. A tiny flame of hope flares to life in his chest. Maybe, just maybe...

But when long seconds pass without any further movement, he starts to shift nervously, glancing back at the rubble blocking the corridor. He’s sure he can hear the faint sounds of movement from the other side; rocks and glass being moved to let their enemies through.

He glances back at Kylo, who is frowning with his entire face. 

“Any moment now, Ren.” 

He unholsters his blaster pre-emptively, glancing at the rubble again. The flame of hope is starting to flicker, repressed by the ever-growing certainty of their doom.

Kylo’s eyes are still closed, sweat rivuleting down his face and into his neck. He growls, “It’s not working.”

“How can it not work?” Hux snaps back, “You were doing it just a second ago.”

Kylo growls at him wordlessly, lowering his hand. “Well, it’s not working anymore. I don’t know why.”

Rocks shift and rattle to the ground on their side of the collapsed corridor. A wave of irritation rolls over Hux. Trust Kylo Ren to fail at possibly the most important task he’ll ever be given at the worst possible moment.

“Just focus, Ren,” he says, gesturing at the doors with his blaster. “Snoke’s right there. He’s right in our grasp. The only thing standing between us and all the power and might of the First Order is those doors.”

Kylo stares at the doors, his eyes suddenly sad, a kind of torn expression tugging his brow down. “Snoke…”

And it hits Hux. This is psychological. On some level, Kylo is still not convinced he’s made the right choice.

Hux fights the urge to roll his eyes and stalks over to him, tucking the blaster under his arm and grabbing Kylo’s hair with his right hand, pulling him down roughly into a deep kiss. For a moment it seems like everything goes quiet, the broken down corridor fading around them, the heat and acrid smell of smoke and burning foliage and all Hux’s aches and pains disappearing into a kind of cool, distant blackness that surrounds them like mist. 

It feels familiar, this empty but comfortable place, and with a start he realizes that Kylo’s wrapped his mind around him again, like that first time they fucked by the river and everything seemed to fade away around Hux except Kylo’s eyes. It’s a close, intense darkness, all of Kylo focused solely on him, but where Hux found it overwhelming before he embraces it now, crawling into it and kind of spreading himself out inside Kylo’s head, seeping into every crevice like fiery red liquid coursing over velvety black. He closes his eyes, kissing Kylo with everything he has. 

The moment his lips leave Kylo’s the real world comes slamming back into him, around him, heat and dust and pain. He blinks, staggered by the suddenness of it, his head reeling as his mind retracts back into itself like the opposite of something erupting.

“Counterproductive,” Kylo mutters, but turns back to the doors again with his hand raised, and a tense moment passes where nothing happens but then, slowly, the doors creak and start to scrape heavily over the floor with a hollow, grating sound. Hux glances over his shoulder at the sound of tumbling rocks. A perfect circle of bright light streams through the floating dust in the corridor; a gap in the rubble big enough to reveal the shiny black plastoid of a ‘trooper’s helmet.

Kylo grates out a low shout, crunching in on himself and dragging his hand into a fist, down towards his stomach, slowly and with apparent weight. The doors shriek in protest, but eventually drag open enough to let them in. Hux is through in an instant, barely waiting for Kylo to follow him inside before grabbing the thick, metal handlebars set on the inside of the doors with both hands and dragging on them, leaning back far enough for his coattails to trail on the chamber’s waterlogged floor and putting all of his weight into it. The doors are heavy, and don’t give easily. Kylo all but slams against the other door, leaning back to tug on it. He grunts, scrunching his face as his arms protest under the weight. Hux hears footsteps running down the corridor; the Stormtroopers have broken through the rubble.

The doors protest a second longer, but then something gives all of a sudden and they slide inwards easily, having been intended to be shut from this side originally. They slam shut just in time. Hux lets go and leans up, sagging back against them, feeling drained, the wound on his shoulder screaming in protest. The heavy wood thuds slightly against his back as the ‘troopers start their assault. He’s not sure how many of them there are; if what remains of both squadrons have all joined this fight, the doors will not hold them for long.

He finally dares to look up at the scene inside the chamber. He half expects Snoke to have some kind of secret army waiting to ambush them, but he sees only Snoke, half-raised out of his chair, with Kylo standing over him, red lightsaber sputtering in his grasp. 

“So it has come to this,” Snoke says softly, sinking slowly back into his chair and tugging his ridiculous blanket up around his shoulders. He has the audacity to look put-upon, as if their attack were nothing more than a tiring annoyance. “My most promising apprentice. So strong with the Force, but weak, always, to temptation.”

Kylo has this expression on his face like he’s collapsing from the inside out. His hand shakes enough to make the lightsaber visibly tremble, and Hux knows, he just  _ knows _ , what’s about to happen next. 

“What are you doing, Kylo?” he grinds out, taking a step away from the doors and towards the Supreme Leader. Behind him, the doors shudder, something heavy ramming them from the other side. 

“You’ve made a mistake, Kylo Ren. Thinking you can come to me with the intention of killing me. Me. Your only family.” Snoke shakes his head, leaning back in his chair-throne with a self-satisfied look. He glances at Hux. “The General has poisoned you, my dear apprentice. But fear not. I am forgiving. I know you are weak, weak against the promise of affection.” 

And, yes, there it is, Kylo’s lowering his lightsaber and kind of taking a step back away from Snoke. Snoke’s eyes are boring into him, suddenly intense, and Hux doesn’t know if he’s using the Force or relying on Kylo’s fear of disappointing him, but somehow, Kylo’s backing down, and the very faint turn of a triumphant smile tugs on the corners of the Supreme Leader’s lips.

“Come back to me, Kylo,” he all but purrs, “Forget about this silly plan and return to your true destiny. He is nothing to you. But I have never failed you. You belong to me, Kylo Ren. Everything you are is because of me. You are nothing without me.”

“Ren,” Hux barks in alarm as Kylo stops, head sinking with a sigh, “what in the fucking name of the old fucking Empire do you think you are doing? Kill him!”

Kylo shakes his head slowly, the red gristling beam of the lightsaber flickering out. “I can’t. If I kill him… everything I’ve done, all the people I’ve killed, all of that will be… just me.” He turns to look at Hux. “I can’t do this, Hux. He’s my master. He’s… everything I am...”

Hux thinks he might actually have a stroke. 

Snoke is smirking, his face twisting into an evil smile he levels at Hux. Hux can hear himself wheezing for breath, angry enough that his vision wavers, Kylo blurring into a kind of black shadow for an instant before solidifying again.

“Now is not the time to have a crisis of conviction!” he manages, sputtering only a little.

“I knew you would choose me,” Snoke says at the same time, glibly, reaching out a wrinkled hand towards Kylo, “You always choose me, in the end. Since you were a little child, it’s always been me. Not your mother, not your father, not your uncle...”

Hux has abruptly had enough. Without even thinking about it too much he slips a hand into the pocket of his greatcoat, pressing down on the trigger of the bomb still resting there and starting the countdown in his head. Ten, nine…

Kylo’s sunk down on his knees in front of Snoke, his head lowered, the lightsaber held in a loose grip at his side and Snoke’s hand resting lightly on top of his hair. The old man is still droning on about Kylo like he’s some kind of pet. Hux refuses to admit how stung he is by Kylo’s betrayal; tells himself he suspected this might happen from the start, that he was never stupid enough to fully trust Kylo to actually go through with killing his precious Supreme Leader.

He got Hux into the Citadel and took care of the Knights. He fulfilled his purpose. And even without him, Hux reasons, Hux will still rule the First Order with a terrifying and systematic hand, and bring its full power to bear on the Resistance, wiping them from the face of the galaxy once and for all without Snoke constantly getting in the way.

But. Something in the curve of Kylo’s back makes Hux pause. He remembers having him inside his body, the way Kylo looked at him, the way he kissed him like he would die if Hux ever stopped. 

God fucking damnit. He can’t kill Kylo.

Five, four…

Hux pulls the bomb from his pocket, biting his lip. This had better work. He directs all his attention on Kylo and yells “ _ Shield! _ ” as loudly as he can with his mind. It must work, because Kylo’s head whips around to stare at him as Hux flings the bomb towards them, as hard as he can, waiting just long enough to see Kylo’s hands fly up to cover his face before diving to the side into the fetid water with his back to them and covering his head with his arms.

Zero.

The explosion rocks the chamber, fire billowing out and over Hux, searing the back of his neck. The ground shakes, water splashing as large chunks of the ceiling break apart and crash to the floor almost right on top of Hux, a wide, gaping hole opening up overhead to let the morning light in. 

Hux waits until he can no longer feel heat on his back before rolling over in the water, leaning up on one elbow to survey the damage. Kylo is thrown clear across the chamber against the opposite wall, crumpled into a heap of black on the floor, but he seems unharmed, dust and leaves gathering on the bubble-like Force shield still around him.

What remains of Snoke is… literally everywhere, no parts solid enough to be identifiable. Chunks of purplish red stick to the walls, leaving trails of blood behind as they slowly slide down into the water, following the pull of gravity. Bits of grey blanket, some still on fire, drift on the rippling water near Hux. One splintered, wooden leg is all that remains of the throne-chair, thrusting into the air defiantly. Hux doesn’t look too carefully at the larger chunk of… something that bumps against his boot in the water. His hat drifts against the wall, upturned, and half dunked under the fetid water like a sinking boat.

He gets up, water cascading off his body, and glances at the chamber doors. They’ve been knocked open, and a ring of Stormtroopers are arrayed just outside, paused in various states of shock. In their midst stands Skullface Ren, who is, apparently, more bulletproof than Hux had given him credit for.

They are all staring inside the chamber in a stupor, shock freezing them in place as Hux gets to his feet. He sloshes over to Kylo, relatively sure that the ‘troopers won’t shoot him. Kylo is staring up at him incredulously too, shock paling his face into a deathly white. 

“What have you done?” he hisses, “Hux, what did you do?”

Hux ignores him and grabs his arm, pulling him up. He’s unwilling and too heavy to move with one hand, Hux’s injured arm all but useless at his side, but Hux is relentless, pulling and prodding until he’s able to maneuver him in front of him awkwardly. Then he turns to the ‘troopers and Skullface Ren, projecting his voice.

“The Supreme Leader is dead,” he says, lifting Kylo’s hand above their heads, “Long live the Supreme Leader.”

There is a moment of perfect silence, time seeming to slow almost to a stop, the constant dripping of water and groaning of the walls as they resettle slowing down into a low, dragging drone. Then, with timing that frankly could have been better, a bright light illuminates the chamber through the hole in the ceiling, the roar of a shuttle kicking up a wind strong enough to whirl water and leaves into the air. Hux looks up, squinting through the spray at what he can just make out of the viewport high above the durasteel hull and recently-repaired burning fusion engines. XN-336 salutes at him through the window, and Hux allows himself a small smile. They may just make it out of here alive. He’ll deal with Kylo’s accusing glare once they’re safely on board.

The moment shatters, and Skullface Ren roars, brandishing his staff in Hux’s direction, “Traitor! You’ll never get away with this!”

“Oh,” Hux drawls, keeping hold of Kylo’s hand and starting to slowly tug him towards the center of the chamber, “But I already have.”

The Stormtroopers seem to be jolted into action by this, raising their rifles in almost perfect unison. So Hux grabs hold of Kylo’s hand in a tighter grip and runs, dragging him behind. A vinyl rope ladder drops from the shuttle above, dangling to a stop just in front of them. He lets go of Kylo and jumps, grabbing onto it and hooking his elbow through the rungs for a grip as he looks back towards Kylo. Kylo is looking between Hux and Skullface Ren, seeming indecisive, and no. There is no way Hux is letting him stay here. “Come on, Ren,” he shouts, yelling over the roar of the shuttle, “we have a galaxy to rule!”

It works. Ren makes a frustrated growl, leaping up to catch the ladder just below Hux. XN-336 reels them in, blaster bolts whizzing all around them as they lift away from the ground, rising into the air and scraping through the jagged hole in the ceiling, out into the morning air.

And as the Citadel shrinks below them, Skullface Ren and the Stormtroopers filling in beneath the patchwork hole in the ceiling like tiny little figurines before eventually fading from sight completely, Hux looks down, meeting Kylo’s eyes, and allows himself to think,  _ today might actually be a good day. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gottmord now has [a prequel of sorts](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11003313), though it isn't necessary to the main plot of this story at all :)


End file.
